<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>The Fabric of Your Hair by saretton</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28437495">The Fabric of Your Hair</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/saretton/pseuds/saretton'>saretton</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Good Omens (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Human, And the skin too, Anxious Aziraphale (Good Omens), Aziraphale Takes Care of Crowley (Good Omens), Barber/Hairdresser Crowley, Body Worship, Competence Kink, Crowley Has Long Hair (Good Omens), Crowley Takes Care of Aziraphale (Good Omens), Crowley's Love Language is Acts of Service (Good Omens), Erotic depictions of shaving, Eventual Happy Ending, Eventual Smut, Explicit Sexual Content, Fluff and Smut, Get your pining and set its level to MAX, Hair Braiding, Hair Washing, Idiots in Love, Love Confessions, M/M, Making Love, Mutual Pining, Neck massages, O come all ye touch-starved, Pins and Needles AU, Smoking, Tailor Aziraphale, Tailoring, The final part of a slow burn, Thirsty Aziraphale (Good Omens), Thirsty Crowley (Good Omens), This is a story on the sense of touch, Touch-Starved, Touch-Starved Aziraphale (Good Omens), Touch-Starved Crowley (Good Omens), What if we touched a lot and we never talked about it? Just kidding... Unless?, fictional smokers are hot, it's about the hands</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 20:49:00</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>28,832</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28437495</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/saretton/pseuds/saretton</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p><em>It’s Thursday, and for Crowley, it’s as if the week started with that day. On Thursday evenings, Aziraphale comes around to his shop, sneaks in through the back door after closing time, and gets his weekly treatment.</em><br/>-----<br/>A Pins and Needles AU.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>332</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>390</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>AJ’s personal faves, Bittersweet Good Omens, Good Omens Human AUs, Ixnael’s Recommendations, Our Own Side</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This fic is dedicated to all the touch-starved people out there (Heaven knows what this year has been), and to Kid Me, whose dream job, among many, was to become a hairdresser.</p><p>Thanks immensely to <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheKnittingJedi/pseuds/TheKnittingJedi">TheKnittingJedi</a>, an irreplaceable beta and a very sweet, very thoughtful and very dear friend.<br/>Thanks also to <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/quiltedspacemittens">quiltedspacemittens</a>, <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/NaroMoreau">NaroMoreau</a> and <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/hanap">hanap</a> for being the loveliest beans and an endless source of joy and support.</p><p>Enjoy, and Happy New Year! We deserve it. :)</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>
  
</p><p> </p><p>And all this is metaphor.<br/>
An ordinary hand — just lonely<br/>
for something to touch<br/>
that touches back.</p><p>Anne Sexton, <em>The Touch</em></p><p> </p><p> </p><p>1.</p><p>In his dreams, Crowley is falling and falling and falling. He hardly dreams anything else that he remembers by dawn. He’s been falling for years. Every time it’s an unexpected flight, and that’s what makes it scary – he desperately wants it to end – to touch ground, to get back on his feet and start moving of his own will, to take steps that are not entirely subjected to gravity, instead of being wrapped up in it and pulled endlessly downwards with nothing he can do.</p><p>What’s it like at the bottom? What is waiting for him? Crowley doesn’t know.</p><p>Will there be a meadow? Will there be a canyon? Crowley doesn’t know.</p><p>Will he go to sleep on soft hills? Will he die, skewered on sharp rocks? Crowley doesn’t know.</p><p>Anthony Crowley only knows he feels hollow and desperate for <em>more</em> every time Aziraphale unfastens his bow tie, every time he undoes the first two buttons of his shirt after taking his jacket off, every time he sits down on the chair in his salon and tilts his head back on the porcelain basin.</p><p>Whenever he covers Aziraphale’s broad shoulders with a swirl of the cape, and whenever he brushes the smooth back of his neck with his fingertips, tying the plastic ribbon into a bow – it’s all on purpose, because he can’t do anything any other way but on purpose, with attention and precision. Whenever Aziraphale is around (on that chair, in his shop, in his life), he’d like not to think of all the sappy, stupid things that crowd his mind; he’d like not to pay attention to his thoughts, huddled together as if sleeping under a small mound of quilts and covers, but actually wide awake all the time.</p><p>Crowley can’t go on like this. He can’t.</p><p>That’s what his mind has been chanting for what feel like ages.</p><p>Years and years of doing this job, season after season of trimming hair and beards and styling locks and dyeing curls, of days spent standing in the shop, of suggesting hues and aftershaves, of blow dryers and perms, of conditioners and moustaches and highlights and undercuts; and every customer who sits at the chair in front of him is just a mirror of Aziraphale. With every customer’s hair, Crowley chases a texture under his fingers that eludes him for most part of the week.</p><p>He’d like to say that Aziraphale is just a person in the crowd. But he’s not.</p><p>He’d like to say that Aziraphale is just a patron he actually likes chatting with, instead of simply listening to them drone on. But he’s more. Aziraphale has always been so much more than just a shave-and-haircut.</p><p>How did he get to this point? Waiting, week after week, to lay his fingers on Aziraphale’s cheeks, on his neck, in his hair, as briefly as he can, as professionally as he’s allowed? Has he no dignity? (<em>No</em>, the toothy voice in the back of his mind says, grinning with delighted scorn. <em>No, you have not</em>. And every time the voice slithers down from his mind to bite the back of his neck.)</p><p>It’s Thursday, and for Crowley, it’s as if the week started with that day. On Thursday evenings, Aziraphale comes around to his shop, sneaks in through the back door after closing time, and gets his weekly treatment.</p><p>Sometimes Aziraphale doesn’t come just for a shave or a haircut or whatever the hell else he feels like having. Crowley knows how and when this happens. There’s a particular halo around that quick-fingered angel, and the more tired and worried Aziraphale is, the dimmer it gets.</p><p>“Would you mind terribly, dear, if you…?” Aziraphale asks on those occasions, with pleading eyes and a weary layer to his voice, already raising his hands to undo his bow tie. An unfinished sentence. There’s no need to complete it. They’ve done this so many times already.</p><p>Crowley watches, stays still, doesn’t ever <em>breathe</em> as this ancient ritual unfurls before his eyes – he just drinks it all, the sudden flow of that thin tartan stripe against Aziraphale’s nape – his own fingers itching, twitching, but otherwise unmoving at his side.</p><p>Aziraphale rubs a palm against the back of his bare neck, closing his eyes, leaning into his own touch and exhaling with relief. And what wouldn’t Crowley give to be that hand, to travel freely on that skin. Lower than he is already allowed by unwritten laws, greedier than he already allows himself to be; not only to loosen sore muscles but to be the hand feeding relief to him, completely, in spoonfuls and slices.</p><p>For now, this will have to do.</p><p>Whenever there’s this fucking massage business, Aziraphale doesn’t look at him, or, when he does, it’s only a glance. He sits down on one of the chairs, gives his back to Crowley, closes his eyes and waits for him. (More likely, he waits for the relief of the massage. Crowley doesn’t know.)</p><p>He bares his neck and the back of his head with a sort of fatal quietness. Technically, Crowley is not a masseur – he only studied the basics of the job, years ago; and Aziraphale is aware of that. But the blind trust that Aziraphale puts in the hands landing on his neck never fails to make Crowley dizzy, and he keeps falling.</p><p>If Crowley were a braver man, he'd indulge. He'd let his fingers run slower, let them plough deeply that soft, soft flesh at the nape, let them rest on the pulse points of that smooth neck. (He knows them all, their positions and reactions; he knows their rhythm and cadence like those of his own heart.)</p><p>If Crowley were a braver man, he'd close his palms gently around the front of that neck – he'd lay them there, where blood is pumped on the highways of the veins, and where heart and mind mingle but never agree. He'd feel life running into that body, closer than ever to Crowley's own pulse in his wrists.</p><p>If Crowley were a braver man, he'd rest his hands on the place where that bow tie usually is, without hurry, without moving them, and he'd feel that throat breathe and swallow under his touch. (He's been wanting to do it for so long. So long. For so long that his fingers twitch and ache even now, and even mid-flight, in his dreams.)</p><p>Crowley is not a brave man.</p><p>But he can give a good neck massage; and whenever Aziraphale asks him, after he's spent a long day humbly on his knees, (eyes down, measuring limbs), or squinting at the sewing machine (neck bent, shoulders sore); when Aziraphale asks him, and his eyes are still down, and his neck is sore and bent, Crowley gives.</p><p>They have become more frequent, these neck massages. Crowley doesn’t know whether to be glad about it, or, more appropriately, just worried. He swings between one feeling and the other like a tree in the gale: with a gentle desperation, always trying to find balance in his roots.</p><p>But it’s always so difficult. It’s difficult here, and it is equally, if not more, whenever Crowley visits the back of Aziraphale’s shop, whenever the tape flies along his limbs, brushing him and touching everywhere. (But of course, Aziraphale is always so meticulous, so professional. He always keeps Crowley at arm’s length. After all, who better than Aziraphale could know what’s at stake for himself?)</p><p>One of the first memories Crowley has of Aziraphale at work involves many tiny details kept close to his heart, orbiting in his mind like the cloud of debris, water and ice forming Saturn’s rings. Measurements for a new pair of trousers; his own bare feet on the soft, deep red carpet of the shop; the dim light of the wall lamps; and Aziraphale, kneeling on the floor, his head bowed in concentration, tiny glasses perched on his upturned nose and his gaze focussed on his fingers.</p><p>Crowley couldn’t remember exactly what had happened before or what would happen after; but, in any case, Aziraphale was about to thread a needle with the precision and the steady hands that would always be his trademark. His almost joined hands, the light shining down, his impossibly luminous hair, his face and part of his hands covered under a layer of shadows – Crowley just took everything in, from the soles of his shoes to the slump of his shoulders, to the way his waistcoat was stretched taut on his broad back.</p><p>“Y’know,” Crowley’s voice jumped out of his mouth and fell down onto Aziraphale before he could stop it, “from here you almost look like a… a praying angel of sorts. One of those nice statues you collect and put on the mantelpiece. That is, I mean…” And thankfully he didn’t say more.</p><p>Aziraphale looked up, and holy God if the light didn’t make his crystal blue eyes brighter.</p><p>He parted his lips, waited a couple of breaths; then he exhaled, “I…” and nothing else. He just smiled, and somehow Crowley didn’t fall forward and on top of him like his words had. That day Aziraphale managed to pull the thread through the eye of the needle on the third try.</p><p>They didn’t speak of it again. They still never speak of so many things. (Crowley remembers them all. He cradles this memory in his cupped hands, like he does with all memories, like water trickling and falling, falling, falling down from a thin mountain waterfall.) Crowley simply started to call Aziraphale ‘angel’, from time to time, and Aziraphale took this in his stride. His eyes glint strangely every time it happens.</p><p>Still, today is a Thursday. Just a normal fucking Thursday, the day around which, apparently, his whole life revolves. Just another evening, like any others, but spent doing <em>this</em>:</p><p>Here, in the half-lit shop, now, after closing time, Crowley takes the shower, opens the tap, feels the water flowing on his fingers. He waits. It gets warmer, little by little, at the rhythm of slow breaths coming from a beloved face. Aziraphale is sitting with his head on the basin, the back of his neck surrounded by towels, and his throat is beautiful and temporarily exposed.</p><p>The water reaches the right temperature – Aziraphale’s favourite: very warm, just this side of scorching. Crowley doesn’t mind that it’s actually a tad too warm for his own skin. As long as it can make Aziraphale relax, it will be good.</p><p>Crowley buries his right hand in a field of curls. This is allowed. The water he pours onto them makes them change their colour, from pale blonde to an opaque gold. The curls get darker; straighter; but never rougher. They couldn’t possibly. If they did, it couldn’t be <em>him</em>.</p><p>Crowley guides the water slowly on that blessed head, paying attention not to let it land on Aziraphale’s forehead. He shields it with his right hand, hoping not to soak him any more than necessary; but each time, it’s a Sisyphean task. The water trickles down, pooling a bit in the shell of Aziraphale’s ear, wetting his temples. Crowley wishes the water, gurgling down the drain, could take Aziraphale’s thoughts with it, washing his head clean of dust <em>and </em>clean of thoughts. But he knows it can’t.</p><p>From time to time he catches Aziraphale’s brow furrow in a flicker. He is thinking – Crowley knows that he is. Something’s on his mind, worrying him. Crowley <em>knows</em>. He knows so many things when it comes to him. They seem too many, for where they’re both at; way too many, for never going forward – for standing behind a porcelain basin, for kneeling on a soft red carpet.</p><p>Crowley would only like to run a hand on that brow, to lay it on that forehead gingerly as if checking for a fever. He’d rest it there, and then he’d trail it temple to temple in a silly holy pilgrimage; and hopefully he’d watch those lines disappear in his palm’s wake. “Hush, hush,” he’d whisper. “Hush angel, pay no mind to it, now. Just relax.”</p><p>Aziraphale would protest. Of course he would. But Crowley wouldn’t mind. And in a murmur he’d add, “Let me take care of you. Let me wash away your worries. Let the world out. Let it be just you under my hands.”</p><p>Every week, Crowley’s fingernails – whatever their colour – are always rather a shock against Aziraphale’s curls. Never quite the same, his nails – with blues and yellows and reds and greens and oranges, and sometimes purples and, most of all, his trademark black. But Aziraphale’s hair is always the same, always soft, always luminous – and, he thinks, it’s soothing to have something steady and immutable to sink your fingers into.</p><p>Just like he’s doing now.</p><p>“Penny for your thoughts,” Crowley says this Thursday, as quietly as he can. The water runs louder than his voice, rinsing this first round of shampoo, but Aziraphale will listen. He always listens.</p><p>And as expected, he breathes out; a curt and mocking thing. He doesn’t need to explain anything.</p><p>“That rough of a day?” Crowley arches his eyebrow, and yes, his voice may be light-hearted and teasing, but it conceals and conceals. It <em>conceals</em>.</p><p>“That rough,” Aziraphale confirms, sinking ever so slightly into the chair, rearranging his limbs under the cape. (There should be no need for a cape while washing hair, but – Crowley knows – Aziraphale likes to keep his clothes in perfect condition. So, cape it is.) Crowley notices his movements and drinks them up, trying to picture them with his mind’s eye. Aziraphale’s Adam’s apple bobs as he gulps; and Crowley notices this too.</p><p>“Gabriel again?”</p><p>“M-mh.”</p><p>Crowley closes the tap, puts the shower and the hose back in the stand, and grabs the bottle of one of the organic shampoos Aziraphale likes.</p><p>Aziraphale opens his eyes briefly, just to shoot an upside down glance to him, and he closes them again. “No, dear, not… not raspberry today. Perhaps– I’d rather–… chamomile, I think.”</p><p>Chamomile. It’s been the <em>roughest</em> of days, then. Crowley switches the shampoo bottles without saying a word. He pours some on Aziraphale’s hair; buries his fingers among those curls again, and starts rubbing his care into the thin, taut layer of skin of Aziraphale’s head.</p><p>He rubs small circles, scratches lightly against the roots. He thinks of jackets and waistcoats and shirts and undershirts. He thinks of what it would feel like to brush just one of his pads there, where he himself has put a cape to shield Aziraphale’s clothes and protect him from who knows what else. Maybe from Crowley himself.</p><p>He tries to blink away these thoughts. The pads of his fingers rub and scratch gently behind Aziraphale’s ears. He tries to blink the thoughts away again. Aziraphale sighs. It’s hopeless; Crowley’s thoughts stay.</p><p>“What did your cousin want, this time?” Crowley can’t help asking, and he’s already biting his tongue. He shouldn’t do this. Not when Aziraphale comes here to relax. But he would also like to help more, to understand what’s come to upset him during the week.</p><p>His hands slide lower, raising the head to scrub the nape. Aziraphale tries to hold back some sort of sound, an unsure and low ‘mmh’. It could have been a moan. (Crowley purses his lips, chases his imagination away. He’s not going to examine that sound this closely, for fuck’s sake. Not <em>again</em>.)</p><p>“He asked me to work overtime. You know how he is.”</p><p>“Again?”</p><p>“Yes. ‘That wedding suit is not sewing itself, Aziraphale’. And ‘Don’t waste <em>my</em> time, Aziraphale.’ And ‘Where are <em>my</em> scissors, Aziraphale?’ ‘Where is <em>my</em> tape?’”</p><p>Crowley doesn’t say anything. His shop doesn’t deal with upper-middle-class, overbearing clientele, nor does it have a Gabriel in it. It’s not his place to make comparisons. He just lets Aziraphale vent, drawing the moment out, and feeling a little selfish and a little greedy because of it.</p><p>For some reason that Crowley still can’t figure out, this Thursday has been a very bad day. There’s no place for cheerfulness and jokes in Aziraphale; there are, instead, long silences and tired, frustrated words. Crowley thinks of all the evenings spent chatting amiably with him, teasing each other, and the memory is soft and warm. He tries to reach for it, to grab its hand, but it fades away as Aziraphale speaks again.</p><p>“And- and those customers. Some of them don’t know what showing respect is. They only show respect to <em>him</em>, because <em>his</em> name is on the sign at the front.”</p><p>Crowley smirks as he rinses Aziraphale’s hair, then he takes the conditioner and applies it as well. “Just a day like any other for us humble working class people, mmh?”</p><p>“At least <em>your</em> customers like chatting,” Aziraphale counters, and there’s a bitter aftertaste in what he says. Among all the things Crowley notices, there’s this one too, and it stings. “I’d really like to talk to some of your little old ladies and your next-door gentlemen, from time to time.”</p><p>The smell of shampoo and conditioner twirls under the dimmed out lights of the shop, twirls and swirls up into Crowley’s nostrils. These scents, these fragrances – he’s come to a point where he connects them instinctually with the angel under his fingers. There’s one for each of his moods, from overjoyed to overtired.</p><p>Crowley knows <em>what</em> Aziraphale smells like. But, he reasons, he doesn’t know what <em>Aziraphale</em> smells like. His natural scent is distant and watered down, drowned by a sea of fruit-flavoured aromas that Crowley himself applies while washing his hair. He’d have to lean in close before starting to work, he'd have to bury his nose somewhere on that skin, in that hair, behind the ear, like a fucking insatiable truffle dog. He’d want to. He’d love to know what exactly a kind, good, gentle soul like Aziraphale's smells like.</p><p>He rinses the conditioner, tilting the shower and not giving in to the need to pet that beloved head properly in long, slow strokes. His fingers itch, almost twitch. He retrieves the hair mask from a shelf. There’s no need for it; Crowley knows Aziraphale’s hair is naturally fluffy and healthy. This is just another little trick of his to draw the moment out. (The toothy voice in his mind chuckles, and bares its fangs, and bites again on the back of Crowley’s neck.)</p><p>But the moment, by definition, is bound to end too quickly; and after applying the mask, and waiting some minutes, and rinsing this too, he only has to escort Aziraphale to another chair and blow dry his hair, feeling it shaping up again in perfect curls that Crowley, somehow, is allowed to touch for not enough time every week.</p><p>Aziraphale receives it all quietly, as relaxed as a mostly stressed out man could be. Crowley notices a weird energy stored and fizzling and ready to snap constantly, hidden under the skin of his scalp. He’d like to scrub it away too, but he doesn’t know whether he should ask about it. Or when. Or how.</p><p>On Thursdays, Crowley is always caught in the duality of time. The evening, while it draws on like an old and loosened rubber band, passes too quickly. At times, after they’ve finished, Aziraphale asks him to go grab a bite. He tells Crowley to meet him at a certain place. Never the same – he likes to change and experiment. They never go there together; they just meet. It’s complicated.</p><p>Still – this is not one of those evenings. The angel is too tired; his halo is tilted sideways, its light is blurred and cold.</p><p>“You sure you don’t want to talk about it?” Crowley asks as soon as he turns off the blow dryer. He tries to meet his eyes in the mirror, but Aziraphale is looking down. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you like… this. At least in a long while.”</p><p>Aziraphale waits patiently for him to unfasten the ribbon and remove the cape (<em>The only thing I’ll take off of him</em> – and Crowley bites his tongue), then he quickly replaces it with his bow tie he’s held all along. In a matter of seconds, Aziraphale builds up his walls again, with a layer of tartan to keep them together.</p><p>Aziraphale makes quick calculations, biting his lower lip lightly. Crowley would like to be those teeth. “There are… news. About the way Gabriel would like to run the shop.”</p><p>“Would you like to talk about it?” Crowley offers again, with a voice that, he hopes, is a reaching hand.</p><p>But Aziraphale shakes his head. “Maybe tomorrow, when you come to my shop for the fitting.” His curls follow his movements, bouncing a little to and fro.</p><p>Maybe tomorrow; maybe next time. In the meantime, Crowley keeps falling.</p><p>Aziraphale stands up from the chair. He looks at himself briefly in the mirror; then, with an absentminded smile that is completely unlike him, he waves at Crowley. (What a ridiculous thing, waving; waving, when Aziraphale’s fingertips brush on his clothes whenever he adjusts the tacking; <em>waving</em>, when Crowley knows the way Aziraphale’s heart beats in the veins of his neck.) Crowley waves back.</p><p>Aziraphale collects his jacket and is gone, without paying as usual, through the same back door he came from.</p><p>The salon is doubly quieter now; Crowley listens to the light above the mirror drone on, as quiet as he’d wanted to talk to Aziraphale tonight. Now and again, it even buzzes with the stories it heard during the day from chatty customers; but Crowley has had a long day and is not listening anymore.</p><p>He heaves a big sigh and falls onto the chair; he looks deep into his reflection in the mirror from where, just a minute ago, Aziraphale was sitting, and the seat is still warm. Crowley grips the armrests tight, and his mind, his soul, his heart somehow all keep falling, falling, falling, falling, falling still.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Ch. 2 should be up in a couple of weeks!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Thanks a bunch to <a href="https://www.archiveofourown.org/users/NoxNoctua/pseuds/NoxNoctua">NoxNoctua</a> for their insight on tailoring - it's been extremely helpful to write this chapter and the next one.<br/>Measurements are in inches and are supposed to follow the UK system. They should be ok; still, I'm but a humble European who isn't familiar with other systems of measurement, so every residual mistake you can spot is entirely my fault!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>2.</p>
<p>It’s almost midnight, and Thursday will soon morph into a brand new Friday; but Aziraphale is not in bed. Not yet. He’s still at his small work station at home, finishing the hems of trousers and shirts for clients he has on the side. They’re part of a much nicer, definitely humbler and private clientele that Gabriel mustn’t know of. They pay much less, but care much more.</p>
<p>Among them all, there is one client who doesn’t pay for anything, but, inexplicably, he seems to care about Aziraphale the most.</p>
<p><em>Ratatatatat</em> goes the sewing machine, <em>ratatatatat</em> the needle pushes in and punches out of the fabric, faster than the human eye can see. Aziraphale (jaw clenched, neck bent, glasses on) focuses his tired eyes on that tiny point of transformation, forces himself to keep the hem straight. Under the stark light of his desk lamp, he tries not to think, and thinks too much.</p>
<p><em>Ratatatatat</em> goes the sewing machine, <em>ratatatatat</em> the thread gets sewn faster than any human hand could; and every journey of the needle through the garment, every point where the hems get stitched into place feels like a part of Crowley’s body, a fraction of his essence that Aziraphale has touched through his clothes and through the years.</p>
<p>As the needle carries the thread in and out, in and out, as the fabric is held under the throat plate, as the feed dogs pull it forward while Aziraphale stays mostly still, he would like nothing else than to delve deeper below the surface, to uncover the mysteries that are still hidden to his fingers.</p>
<p>Aziraphale has already solved some of these mysteries; for instance, the way Crowley laughs. To be precise, Crowley smiles generously, employing a thin ribbon of closed lips and raised eyebrows; but when he laughs you simply can’t <em>not</em> be happy. Crowley bares his little, regular, sharp teeth and Aziraphale can’t help it – he’s already smiling in turn, as if he were Crowley’s mirror.</p>
<p>Aziraphale knows that Crowley can’t seem (or doesn’t really want) to stand straight, uncaring of the laws of gravity and of the consequences in the long run. He does that only when Aziraphale waltzes around him to take his measurements for who knows what piece of clothing. He knows his favourite band (the Velvet Underground) and his favourite movies (the James Bond saga), though he’s not a fan of either himself; but he could listen to Crowley rambling about them for weeks, because that’s when he can see the passion and the excitement brimming out of his friend, inundating him in turn. He knows exactly how many glasses of wine, whiskey or beer will get Crowley from cheerful, to sloshed, to passed out on the couch, snoring almost inaudibly. He knows Crowley’s point of view on free will, on the concepts of good and evil, and as a matter of fact, they don’t entirely agree on many things; but Aziraphale likes having someone who will keep his mind alert, who can stimulate it and leave him with food for thought every time.</p>
<p>But still. Those other unreachable mysteries seem important to get the whole picture of him. They’re just some missing pieces, that’s all. The puzzle could still be considered complete, but… What about Crowley’s skin – how would it feel if he touched it? What about his throat, his face? What about his hair? Aziraphale is too cautious and too professional to try and find out.</p>
<p>Their arrangement is mostly unspoken. He sews bespoke suits on the rare occasions Crowley needs them, and Crowley repays him with weekly treatments; every massage on Aziraphale’s neck or face, every shave or trimming of his hair equals a threadbare hem to fix, or a fitting to tighten Crowley’s clothes.</p>
<p>Because of course Crowley likes them tight. Tighter. The tightest. Particularly his trousers. And Aziraphale knows that Crowley gets a tad thinner whenever he’s anxious or worried, so his trousers will need to be fixed. When they can’t get any tighter, or when he gains a little weight back in happier times, Crowley buys a new pair that must be inevitably tightened as well; and whenever Aziraphale has to fit those trousers, or on the rare occasions he’s asked to sew a bespoke pair, the first thing Crowley says will always be, “Make them tight.” And time after time, pair after pair, Aziraphale has never answered <em>no</em>.</p>
<p>(<em>Hold </em>me<em> tight, tighter, the tightest</em>, he’d actually like to tell Crowley. Tight like Crowley’s hands have never been in his hair; tight like they always are around Aziraphale’s heart in a way Crowley’s not even remotely aware of. <em>Hold me. Don’t let me go.</em>)</p>
<p>All of Crowley’s jeans and trousers look almost like they’re glued to his body; getting them on and off every day must be quite a challenge. They seem painted on him, molten on him, so much that they could very well <em>be</em> Crowley’s skin.</p>
<p>But – and the sewing machine stitches the idea into his brain, lethal and unhelpful, like it always does – if that’s the case, Aziraphale <em>has</em> already touched Crowley’s skin, more than once.</p>
<p>And yet, all in all, Aziraphale doesn’t have as much time to fix Crowley’s clothes as he’d like. Gabriel buries him with work and keeps him almost on a leash with an unspoken promise of ruination in his eyes, should Aziraphale ever mingle with the wrong people.</p>
<p>Aziraphale knows his own talent. He considered quitting, once or twice; but he doesn’t know how to run away from this suffocating job situation, this predicament he’s pushed himself into. How would he explain this to Crowley? That he’s willing to quit his job because of him? He has a feeling he’d laugh in his face, or he’d be angry. It would be stupid. Saying goodbye to his position in one of the most prestigious tailor shops – who in his sane mind would do that? And what would he do, then? Where would he go to? Who would hire him? It’s better to simply stick to the status quo, even if it implies working overtime almost daily; even if it implies not being able to meet Crowley in the open, in front of one their shops, or to talk to Crowley the way he’d really like. This has to be enough.</p>
<p>Even rarer are the occasions in which Aziraphale can sew Crowley bespoke clothes, for a number of reasons.</p>
<p>First of all, Crowley doesn’t really need <em>suits</em> for his job. He has his work uniform already. Secondly, Aziraphale insists on sewing everything by hand when it comes to Crowley, however long it may take.</p>
<p>But even so, there <em>have</em> been occasions he’s asked Aziraphale for a suit (Aziraphale’s mind promptly turning into a black hole at Crowley’s words: “A wedding suit,” before it became clear that no, one of Crowley’s <em>friends</em> was getting married and he’d be just a guest); and whenever Crowley asks with a pleading mouth and his forehead creases in inexplicable shame, Aziraphale always agrees. How could he ever refuse? It’s a <em>quid pro quo</em>, an endless, willing loop of favours. It’s their arrangement. And most importantly, it’s Crowley.</p>
<p>Crowley’s measurements are not ideal, but they’re perfect, because they’re his.</p>
<p>Even though Aziraphale knows them all by heart, and he could draw that body on paper even wearing a blindfold, somehow Crowley would still be Crowley if his waist measurement weren’t exactly twenty-nine inches, if his inseam weren’t thirty-three, if his chest circumference weren’t thirty-four. If Aziraphale took all of Crowley’s measurements carefully stored in his brain and tore them to pieces until he couldn’t remember a single one of them, it wouldn’t change a thing. Crowley would be Crowley just the same.</p>
<p>But Aziraphale is not talking only about the numbers that make up Crowley’s body. He’s far beyond the point of considering just his proportions and shapes. Crowley has always been so much more than inches on a tape.</p>
<p>Crowley is kind and compassionate and listens to him, whatever he may say. He’s charming and witty, he’s sarcastic when he gets nervous, and he’s sweet when Aziraphale least expects him to be. (This happens quite often, given Crowley’s sunglasses. They give him a mostly imperturbable face that could mislead anyone. Even after all these years, Aziraphale is still surprised by these sudden bursts of softness, and he likes how this side of Crowley feels always new to him.)</p>
<p>Crowley is pointy and soft at the same time; he can be inscribed both in a square and a circle, and they miraculously overlap, framing him in the middle. He’s Aziraphale’s Vitruvian man. That’s what makes Crowley perfect.</p>
<p>And as perfection should be worshipped, there is no one Aziraphale would rather kneel in front of but Crowley.</p>
<p>A large slice of Aziraphale’s life up to now has been just this: wondering. A collection of dusty ‘what if’s. And for the most part, Aziraphale wonders, beneath all the layers, what Crowley’s skin feels like. He knows there are freckles, thrown artfully on his arms and face like handfuls of dried lentils. He knows he is lean and his joints are a little knobby, and sometimes they pop when he moves them too fast. And once, while taking his chest circumference, Aziraphale even spotted a harmless, round and tiny beauty mark on his neck. But what does <em>Crowley</em> feel like?</p>
<p>Every time Aziraphale receives a neck or a face massage from Crowley, or whenever he scratches Aziraphale’s scalp with his pads, or whenever – Lord have mercy – he feels so brave as to ask Crowley for a shave, Aziraphale tries to store in his brain all the careful, light touches of Crowley’s fingers on his head and face. But he’s discovered that, as good as he may get at this little lonely game of memory – matching past touches to sensations that are no longer there – he’ll always want more. He’ll always want Crowley’s hands to wander further, to venture lower, to spread wider, and, and perhaps to grab, to stroke, and to slide, or to stretch or, or, or to pump – but ultimately just… to hold him, just to hold him, always to hold him – to hold him tight, tighter, the tightest.</p>
<p>At the end of the day, he knows Crowley’s measurements. That’s all. He knows how far he’s allowed to go: he knows how to touch him while measuring his back, his waist, his chest, his hips, or his rise, or his inseam; just the bare minimum, in order not to startle him. He <em>can</em> feel the shift of muscles inside the trousers, tight as they are. (He wonders, he always wonders. What is it like beyond the borders of garments and clothes? Or, what would happen if he were reckless, if he put the palm of his hand flat on the front of Crowley’s trousers, slowly, kneeling down, looking up into his eyes? Would the world really end? Or would it start?) But he’s a professional. Whenever he takes Crowley’s measurements for the umpteenth time, his fingers don’t shake. Not visibly, at least.</p>
<p>Back to reality, his spine is starting to cry in pain more than in simple protest, and Aziraphale decides his time at the sewing machine is over for the night. He finishes the last hem, then he stands up, stretches his back and arms and wrists, clears the work station up a little and switches to the other tasks he has planned before going to bed. He must keep up with work, and not even regular overtime hours are enough.</p>
<p>Aziraphale has already prepared the paper patterns for one of Gabriel’s clients’ new coat during the last few evenings. He’s spent hours and hours creating them, measuring inch by inch, tracing lines in pencil on large cardboards, then cutting everything attentively. They’re brand new, clean and ready.</p>
<p>(“Oh, Crowley, I must have misplaced the memo sheet with your measurements. Silly me, I can’t find it anywhere… But to be quite frank, I’ve noticed you’ve, uhm, built up some muscle, dear. If I may say so. Better to take those measurements again, don’t you think? Just to be sure.”</p>
<p>And well – what must Crowley think, really, whenever this little comedy is acted out in front of him, as if Aziraphale were a third-rate actor? Is Crowley even aware that this is all an excuse, that he knows all the measurements by heart, and that it’s always been like that, from the very first time he took them?</p>
<p>Really, though. How pathetic can he be? Unfurling the tape over and over and over and over, straightening and bending it and tracing circles with it, just to touch that blessed man. Lonely points of contact, mostly through clothes, twinkling once or twice like lighthouses in the night and then vanishing in a wisp of smoke as he takes the tape away. Touches like an asteroid always on the verge of colliding with a planet, but eventually flying by it unscathed as soon as Aziraphale removes the tape; until another measurement needs to be taken, and the asteroid approaches the next celestial body, and gravity tries to make it crash down again.</p>
<p>Some people would say that one can’t elude gravity forever; Aziraphale would say he’s managed. So far.)</p>
<p>He irons the fabric, carefully, slowly, methodically. All the creases and wrinkles disappear, leaving a flat plain in his hand’s wake.</p>
<p>(And what if his hand flattened on Crowley’s chest? On his back? On his stomach? He’d surely feel muscles moving, Crowley’s breath adjusting. A tectonic shift just under the surface.)</p>
<p>He folds the fabric and matches the pattern between the two layers with maniacal precision.</p>
<p>(Would Aziraphale’s fingers leave a pattern on Crowley’s skin, if there weren’t those layers of clothing between them? If he actually pressed a little harder with his pads? If his fingernails scratched and left tiny crescent moons on the land of his back? Would Crowley like that?)</p>
<p>He traces the shapes to cut in white chalk, using the paper pattern.</p>
<p>(Oh, he’s traced Crowley in his mind so many times already… And yet. Some places are still unknown. What about his chin? Or the underside of his jaw? Would Crowley allow him to trace the line of his nose, the lid of his eyes? To caress his cheeks and learn them by heart like all the other measurements of him?</p>
<p>The straight and round lines he draws in chalk remind him of squares and circles, and of Crowley, there, right in the centre, staring into his soul with his perceptive eyes.)</p>
<p>Finally, it’s cutting time. Aziraphale’s twelve-inches scissors part the fibres like butter, bite through the fabric with a control Aziraphale doesn’t seem to have on his own life.</p>
<p>(His mind, unhelpful as always, is already cutting through Crowley’s clothes, tearing them with bare hands. The idea is vague but ferocious, and it reverberates like an explosion. Something unholy but necessary. Shredding and ripping the clothes to bits, making them nothing but cloths fit for dusting. And then – being so brave as to lay his chin on Crowley’s shoulder, and holding him. Skin on skin, heart against heart. Tight, tighter, the tightest.)</p>
<p>Aziraphale’s brow twitches and frowns with concern. These visions are shocking, and wonderful, and inappropriate, and dangerous. They always are.</p>
<p>Then again, Crowley <em>is</em> shocking, and wonderful, and inappropriate, and dangerous. He always is, even though the first time Aziraphale saw him he hadn’t realised it.</p>
<p>Gabriel had hired Aziraphale to fill a vacancy at the tailor shop, and that was his first week of work. He was opening the front door, flipping the sign to Open. It was nine o’clock, the first client was scheduled to come an hour later, Gabriel was still nowhere to be found, and Mrs. Nutter, Aziraphale’s old part-time colleague wasn’t supposed to start working until after lunch. Aziraphale stepped outside to breathe some fresh air and he studied his surroundings. Everything was still so new to him, so exciting, ready to be discovered. He tried to take in as much as he could of the hustle and bustle of that ordinary London street, until–</p>
<p><em>Rrrrrrrrip</em>.</p>
<p>“Oh, shit. Oh – oh, fuck!”</p>
<p>He heard a loud voice to his right. Aziraphale turned around and saw a tall, lean man, with dark red, shoulder-length hair perfectly braided on the back of his neck, wearing a pair of sunglasses that couldn’t conceal his panic. “Oh, dear,” Aziraphale said instinctually. “Do you need a hand?”</p>
<p>The man grimaced. A sleeve of his sky blue shirt showed a long tear from the back of his wrist up to his elbow. He heaved a couple of ragged breaths among the uncaring passer-bys, then he turned to Aziraphale as if they’d both just landed on that spot in the street. “I have a – a job interview in fifteen,” the man said with a voice that could have engraved a tombstone. “This is… was… my only decent shirt.”</p>
<p>Aziraphale was speaking before even realising it. “This is a tailor’s. I can help you.” The man got a better look at him and, in his desperation, seemed to notice the sign and the window of the shop only then. “Come in, quick,” Aziraphale said hastily, with a smile that couldn’t conceal his exhilaration at the prospect of helping someone. Then, remembering that what he was about to do couldn’t be exactly regarded as legitimate or normal, he added, “From the back door,” and he pointed surreptitiously to a nearby courtyard.</p>
<p>His plan was simple. There was a white shirt he was supposed to put on display on the mannequin in the window, switching it with the light blue one of the previous season, and… well… he only hoped it would fit.</p>
<p>He went back inside, and as he waited for his new friend to join him, he hastily removed the mannequin from the window, took off its jacket and started to unbutton the light blue shirt underneath in an inexplicable frenzy; then, all of a sudden, he remembered he actually had to unlock the back door to let that unlucky fellow in. A handful of seconds later, the man and his half-destroyed sleeve were making their way into the back of the shop.</p>
<p>“How did it happen?” Aziraphale said, examining the tear more closely and assessing that it was, in fact, beyond repair in the short term. He gave the man a quick once-over, trying to guess his size. Yes, hopefully like the mannequin’s. Then he started running around the shop. Where had Gabriel put that new shirt, now?</p>
<p>“There was a – a nail or somethin’ in the wall,” the man said, quietly, and Aziraphale felt his gaze following him as he fluttered in the room, opening random drawers in his first-week-at-this-job inexperience. “I’d just… turned sideways to let a pram pass, but when I tried to walk on – well. Seems like the shirt got stuck in that thing, and… <em>rrrrip</em>,” the man concluded, popping the ‘p’.</p>
<p>“You’ve been lucky that nail didn’t scratch you.” Aziraphale opened another couple of drawers, rummaged some more, and then – “Ah-ha!” He put the newfound shirt next to the mannequin, and handed the light blue one to the redhead. “Here, take this. It’s not been ironed in a while, but… I hope it’s at least better than having half your sleeve like that.”</p>
<p>The man hesitated but eventually he took it, stroking and looking at the fabric as if it had been the first shirt he’d ever seen in his life. He had long, fine, freckled fingers, and Aziraphale caught himself staring and thinking he could have counted all the veins on their backs, visible as they were.</p>
<p>The man was still looking at the shirt, gaping a little, his whole face between puzzled and incredulous – Aziraphale couldn’t tell, given the sunglasses he wore; but, seeing the man’s inaction, he was starting to feel nervous, the panic of not helping him in time for that job interview stalking closer; and at the same time he also felt unexpectedly cheerful, and galvanised, and exuberant, as if he were in the middle of an adventure.</p>
<p>In short, he was <em>feeling</em>; which, admittedly, was not the best thing if he wanted to be of any help. He had to pull himself together, focus on the practicalities of the matter. “For Heaven’s sake, what are you waiting for, dear boy? Just – just wear it. Seems to me you don’t have much time left before that interview. Chop-chop!”</p>
<p>“But, but I – no, I couldn’t possibly–”</p>
<p>“Yes – yes, you can, you <em>can</em>,” Aziraphale said, euphoric and determined, taking the garment back from his slim fingers, careful not to touch them, and gesturing for the man to take the torn shirt off. The man hesitated again; then, in what Aziraphale read as an impulsive show of decency, he turned around, untucked his shirt and started unbuttoning it.</p>
<p>Aziraphale was left there, dumbstruck, with the light blue shirt in his hands, and couldn’t help it – he followed the shift of those shoulder blades, their outline suddenly visible, angles jutting out and moving rhythmically button after button, and he let his gaze travel lower, lower, until he reached the belt line, and…</p>
<p>And Aziraphale should have known since that very moment that he’d be done for in a matter of weeks.</p>
<p>As he tore his eyes away, Aziraphale held the shirt open like a valet would do with his master’s dressing gown. After some seconds, a pair of arms slithered carefully into the sleeves, and as soon as he felt the man’s back approaching, he withdrew his hands as if the shirt had been on fire.</p>
<p>He heard himself talking to fill the dense silence in the room while the man buttoned himself up and tucked the shirt in. “I know, it’s not perfect – I think the seams aren’t exactly regular on the armpits, if you pay attention, and the collar isn’t properly symmetrical, and – well, it’s just a – a shirt we had, after all, but… I dare say it looks – lovely, on you. How does it feel?”</p>
<p>The man turned around to face him and took off his sunglasses to reveal two pools of liquid gold, big honey eyes that stared directly into Aziraphale’s. Aziraphale felt weak at the knees. That colour was going straight to fuel his ridiculous smile, so he busied himself with closing drawers all around.</p>
<p>The man walked to a tall mirror nearby and stared at his own reflection, then his eyes flicked to Aziraphale’s face again. “Feels… ’s perfect, I think.”</p>
<p>“Is… is it?” Aziraphale asked, in a breath he hadn’t realised he was holding.</p>
<p>“Yes,” the man whispered, without really looking like he had a clear understanding of the situation.</p>
<p>Aziraphale beamed at him and wiggled in happiness. He’d made it. The man still had a chance to go to that interview. The poor dear was in a hurry, though, and Gabriel could arrive any moment. It wasn’t the time for small talk. “Wonderful, and now buck up! Go there and get that job, my dear!”</p>
<p>The redhead staggered to the back door, and as he was about to get out, he said, “I’ll return the shirt to you as soon as-”</p>
<p>“Not a problem, that’s quite alright, but now hurry up, and break a leg! Mind how you go.”</p>
<p>Later, as he stood by the shop door, he didn’t know why he was watching that man walking dazedly back in the street. The most logical reason was that he wanted to make sure the poor fellow would have no further accidents, but…</p>
<p>Aziraphale had acted like a sort of guardian angel to him, but names hadn’t been asked or exchanged. With a sigh, Aziraphale wished him the best of luck, and went back to tidy up the chaos he’d left in the back room before he could discover where exactly the redhead was going.</p>
<p>As it turned out, the man got the job; and Aziraphale discovered they were practically working neighbours in a rather unusual way.</p>
<p>The day following that unusual first meeting, Gabriel arrived rather early for what Aziraphale would later define ‘his typical hour’. They opened the shop together, then Gabriel started one of his incredibly depressing motivational speeches, while they casually watched the street, standing on the threshold.</p>
<p>“You must understand, Aziraphale, that our shop aims to serve only a certain kind of customers. People who know other <em>people</em> and can help expand the business. Sewing bespoke suits is a slow process, as you certainly are aware, and it may take a while before we work for big personalities, but I have great plans for the future of my shop.”</p>
<p>While Aziraphale listened to him, he became aware of something else.</p>
<p>The man from the day before was standing in front of a hair salon a little further down the street, on the opposite side of the road, smoking a cigarette. (Was he nervous? Could be. It was his first day at a new job, after all.) His clothes weren’t formal, now – he was wearing a half-apron and a t-shirt. Surely the salon’s uniform.</p>
<p>Gabriel followed his gaze. “Yep, look at that guy over there, for instance.” He pointed very clearly at him. “That is exactly the kind of person I’m talking about, someone who should have <em>nothing</em> to do with our tailor house and our public image. I’m sure you understand why.”</p>
<p>Aziraphale watched in silence their new neighbour putting out the cigarette and going back to work into the salon. The memory of those hands sliding into the sleeves of the shirt he’d held open was still very fresh, very close and, he discovered now, a little dangerous. (Aziraphale couldn’t know that the memory would stay with him, among many others, years and years later.) "But what if he wanted to become our customer?" he asked. The cufflinks of his own sleeves were pressing the fabric tight onto his wrists, and he twisted them, trying to loosen them somehow. "What if he wanted, for instance, a suit?"</p>
<p>"Don't be ridiculous, Aziraphale. He could <em>never</em> afford one. Not here, in my shop. Besides," Gabriel paused with intention, "should anyone like him ever dare to enter… well. I'm sure you would show him the door immediately and you’d warn me. Wouldn't you?"</p>
<p>Aziraphale looked at his cousin for a long moment. Eventually, he lowered his eyes.</p>
<p>They went back in and did not discuss it further.</p>
<p>Later, that same evening, just as Aziraphale was closing the shop after his first hour of overtime work and Gabriel and Mrs. Nutter had already gone home, he found the redhead near the back door, smoking again, his back leaning against the wall.</p>
<p>“Thanks for the shirt,” he said as soon as he saw Aziraphale, handing it back to him on a coat hanger. He shoved his free hand into one of the unbelievably narrow pockets of his jeans. “I’ve washed it back home, yesterday, after the interview. Went pretty well, by the way – I got the job; we’re basically neighbours now, y’know?… Ah, should’ve asked, perhaps– maybe I needed to wash that with special treatments and whatnot? I hope it’s not ruined. Anyway, uh, yeah. Thanks. Oh, uhm – name’s Anthony. But you can call me by surname. Crowley, that is. I – ’s just that I like it better, is all.” And he closed his mouth.</p>
<p>“Aziraphale Fell,” he introduced himself in turn with a tiny smile. He looked at the shirt in his own hands, and when he raised his eyes to look at Crowley again, Aziraphale had become very serious. “Would you like… a suit?”</p>
<p>Crowley’s throat articulated a hand-picked selection of clashing consonants, then he threw his cigarette away without even putting it out. “Would I… a <em>wot</em>?”</p>
<p>“A suit, dear. A <em>bespoke</em> suit.”</p>
<p>And thus, eventually, after some convincing, Aziraphale sewed Crowley’s first suit; and Crowley offered to repay him with a special hair treatment of his (“You can come to my salon anytime. Let’s say, Thursday evening?”). The never-ending loop of their arrangement was born.</p>
<p>And yes, at first Aziraphale may have started sewing for Crowley in secret mostly to spite Gabriel. But then… then, after some time, he found out that he wasn’t really considering it as a small act of rebellion against Gabriel anymore. Stitch after stitch, day after day (and, also, dinner after dinner, and joke after joke, and touch after touch), his mind became clearer and clearer, more and more focussed, to the point where, tonight, as he sews, he imagines his fingers on a waist twenty-nine inches wide. He imagines holding Crowley tight, tighter, the tightest; he imagines finally being allowed to lay a hand on his head, and petting it, and knowing at last what the fabric of Crowley’s hair feels like under his fingers. He masks his cowardice, shamefully, under an unstable sheen of professionalism.</p>
<p>Crowley always keeps his hair tied in a high ponytail or in a low bun as he works in the salon, or when he comes to the tailor shop, or whenever they meet in secret after work, really. Lush and dark red and sweetly wavy, and it catches the light with every kind of unexpected natural highlights. It looks absolutely fantastic, just what a hair stylist’s hair should be like.</p>
<p>If only Aziraphale could see it down, in all its length, spread on Crowley’s sharp shoulders in all its splendour, just for a moment; if only if he could touch it, or run his fingers through it, or even braid it with his own inexperienced hands; if only this were possible, and not unprofessional, and it wouldn’t have <em>consequences</em>, he’d treat that hair with the care Crowley uses on him always, whenever Aziraphale goes to the salon for a haircut, or a massage, or, ultimately, for a shave.</p>
<p>Letting Crowley shave his face is as far as Aziraphale allows himself to go. It’s Crowley the one who talks for the most part, whenever this happens, and of course he guides him and gives instructions, forbidding Aziraphale to move his mouth for fear of cutting him. (But how could he? Crowley’s so skilled, so careful, so precise. Aziraphale feels lucky and proud and honoured just to be his friend.)</p>
<p>Crowley hums to himself as he stirs the white shaving foam and spreads it on Aziraphale’s face with a soft brush. It tickles, but it’s a pleasant feeling. Aziraphale exhales a closed-mouthed laugh in anticipation. Crowley sucks his own lips in, and Aziraphale is quick to mimic him to let the brush whiten that last patch of skin. The massaging motion, the proximity of Crowley’s face to his, the intensity of those golden eyes would be already enough to send Aziraphale’s mind to outer space, but this is only the beginning.</p>
<p>At Aziraphale’s specific request, Crowley uses one of the heirlooms of the Fell family: an antique straight razor with a silver handle, kept in tip-top condition. As soon as Crowley opens it, the blade shines and winks at the light even in the half-gloom of the salon.</p>
<p>And then – then comes Aziraphale’s favourite part; he closes his eyes, relaxes his whole body under the towels and the cape, and lets Crowley’s fingertips cup his chin, tilting his head from side to side. He likes being at Crowley’s mercy; he knows those hands are safe. Crowley talks softly to him, Aziraphale lets himself be rocked and lulled, and the razor drags along his skin in slow, deep strokes, surprisingly gentle but precise.</p>
<p>Crowley’s hands work their magic – they know exactly where to go and what to do. They keep touching Aziraphale’s face, moving the razor swiftly against his throat, on his cheeks, around his mouth, sowing smooth skin in the blade's wake, and Crowley’s smiling voice keeps touching his soul. Sometimes he gets so close that Aziraphale can feel him breathing and speaking into his ear; all he can do is take what he’s given, laugh, and shiver in silence.</p>
<p>It’s the most intimate moment Aziraphale can get from him; and yet Aziraphale, being Aziraphale, has bigger, more dangerous dreams, colourful fantasies involving other kinds of strokes against his skin, lucid visions that make his eyes go white and his breaths run short. They don’t last more than precious minutes, exactly like each shave.</p>
<p>When it’s all over and they’re both left smiling and satisfied with Crowley’s efforts, Crowley wipes Aziraphale delicately with a towel, one last thoughtful gesture to clean him and remove the excess of white foam from his skin. He often suggests an aftershave or a particular kind of cologne suited to the occasion and to the mood. Aziraphale runs his fingertips on his own cheeks and skin, there, where moments before Crowley’s pads have landed to tilt his head; their eyes meet in the mirror, and they resume talking as if nothing has happened at all.</p>
<p>What really happens, though, beyond all the fantasies and their warm, bittersweet haze, is that Aziraphale keeps Crowley’s at arm’s length for the sake of their friendship. God knows what Gabriel would do to the both of them if he discovered they’ve been fraternising. They could both lose their jobs, given that they’ve worked for years, using the tools and the rooms of their shops, without asking payment of any kind.</p>
<p>Even further, Aziraphale is aware that, if one of their touches lingered too long, it would inevitably bring his downfall. It would mean confessing his feelings to Crowley. And – this is what concerns him the most – Aziraphale feels that, doing so, he would also scare Crowley away. He’d lose him too. But now all these efforts will be useless anyway.</p>
<p>It’s almost half past two when Aziraphale gives in to fatigue and throws himself in bed. Enough with the sewing, enough with the cutting, enough with the dreaming. Tomorrow – tomorrow he’ll have to break the news to Crowley. He’ll have to tell him that their arrangement is officially over. He feels so worn out, so stranded and threadbare, and reality is pushing down so hard onto him, that he doesn’t even cry; he lays there, staring at the alarm clock on his nightstand, watching time as it flies away.</p>
<p>Tomorrow is doomsday; and Aziraphale can’t sleep.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I'm currently editing ch.3 and I should be able to post it in a couple of weeks. In the meantime, Happy New Year, friends!! :D Let's keep taking care of each other 🧡</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>3.</p><p>It’s way past closing time, this Friday, and Aziraphale is waiting. The parquet has been swept, the carpet vacuumed; the blinds are already lowered, the scissors on the table, the pincushion on the stool, the tape around his neck, over his bowtie – layer upon layer, shield over shield. It all seems trivial and insignificant, completely inadequate to protect him from the chasm he’s going to face in a matter of minutes. He’s grasping every bit of comfort he can, summoning all the courage he’s never had, grounding himself with little reassuring things.</p><p>Crowley should arrive any moment now. Actually, he’s late. He usually is, when they meet under different circumstances, for reasons that have to do with style (what Crowley would call ‘looking cool’, or his concept of it at least). Except that he’s never late when he comes for a fitting; they would both be tired after a long day’s work, and neither of them would want to add to Aziraphale’s wild amount of overtime.</p><p>So, what’s taking Crowley so long? Aziraphale wrings his hands. He should have arrived ten minutes ago already; and today – <em>today</em>, of all possible days – he’s making Aziraphale wait. The heels of Aziraphale’s Oxfords clink on the tiles of the back room. His fretful steps echo in the empty shop; the sound bounces everywhere, stuffing wardrobes and drawers to bursting. His anxiety feels like a humanoid creature sitting in a chair; a silent monster waiting with him, watching and judging his every movement and distressed sigh.</p><p>He paces to the main shop just to push some of his worry out of his feet, leaving a nice little trail for the anxiety monster to follow after some seconds; it walks on his footprints through the tiles, then the soft red carpet, then on the parquet, silently breathing on his neck, staring with its judgemental gaze. Will that beast ever let him breathe?</p><p>Lacking an answer, and without really wanting to know it, Aziraphale walks to the blinds and lifts one of the slats to check the street outside. Just to be sure…</p><p>And, ah, there he is.</p><p>His relief of seeing Crowley across the street mixes with a sudden wave of confusion, and he can’t help sucking in a worried breath as he notices what he’s doing.</p><p>(“Really, dear. It won’t be any good for your health. You should quit.”</p><p>“Should I, mmh?” Crowley arched an eyebrow. (Unfair, it’s absolutely and incredibly <em>unfair</em> how much he’s always been able to convey such a spectrum of emotions and intentions without taking those sunglasses off.)</p><p>Aziraphale pretended not to notice the way Crowley was holding the cigarette between pointer and middle finger, how his left hand took it to Crowley’s smile, how his lips welcomed it, closing around it just for a few seconds before freeing it and releasing a trail of smoke from his nose. In another life, he could have been a dragon.</p><p>“You should, indeed. Your poor lungs will be ruined if you keep up with this.”</p><p>“Ah!” Crowley barked, tilting his head all the way back and looking at the sky. The stars above London were exceptionally visible, that evening, almost bright, looking down onto that alley outside of an Indian restaurant. (Aziraphale can’t remember the name of that place, now, but it’s not important. He remembers other details that feel at once tiny and fundamental: that Crowley had been talking about how some regular clients had turned to a competitor just to save a few pounds on a haircut; Crowley’s concern and prattle about the financial loss caused by this unexpected migration, his own offering to start paying Crowley for his weekly treatments, and his friend’s immediate and categorical refusal; the way the tiny orange glow of the cigarette was mirrored on his sunglasses; Crowley’s fingernails, painted navy blue. He remembers Crowley.)</p><p>Crowley kept gazing at the starry sky. Aziraphale had expected him to laugh at his remark, to scoff at it or shrug it off. But he did nothing of the sort. “Y’know,” he said instead, “maybe one day I <em>will </em>quit.”</p><p>That answer soothed Aziraphale’s concerns a little. “I’m glad to hear it. At least it’s a resolution. When do you think you’ll be able to?”</p><p>“The day you stop worrying.” Crowley puffed a little ring of smoke up, into the night air.)</p><p>Back then, Aziraphale still didn’t know exactly what the premise was whenever Crowley lit up a cigarette. But he knows now, and it’s actually quite simple.</p><p>Crowley smokes whenever he’s nervous. Seeing him with a cigarette is an implicit warning, one that Crowley, standing there in the street, taking his time, probably never meant to give to Aziraphale in the first place. Has Crowley sensed his nerves yesterday as he washed his hair? Is this a way to try to shake them off himself?</p><p>Aziraphale’s eyes linger a little longer on him, on that familiar yet mysterious figure leaning against a wall, on the man whose life he is trying to protect somehow. He wonders whether Crowley can spot him from where he is, even with the blinds lowered and the lights dimmed. If he can, he doesn’t let it show. Then again, all this reasoning will seem meaningless very soon.</p><p>When Crowley puts his cigarette out and heads to the courtyard leading to the back room, Aziraphale backtracks. He spins on his heels so violently that he finds himself face to face with the anxiety beast, which has been breathing on his neck all this time. He frantically tries to shove it aside for a moment, tidying up a couple of things that will become untidy in a few minutes during the fit. Eventually he gives up. He turns the lights off, retreats to the back room, and waits.</p><p>Sure as rain, Crowley comes in, greeting him with a warm smile. How is he allowed to make this even more difficult? The man hasn’t even taken off his sunglasses, and Aziraphale’s plans feel sabotaged already.</p><p>After some unusual hesitation from both sides, Crowley’s low boots saunter through the back room and follow Aziraphale to the main shop, where he switches the lights back on and dims them immediately. There should be no danger of Gabriel coming here at this hour, but even though fiddling with the lights is as ridiculous as a protection can aspire to be, Aziraphale does it anyway. He always has. It gives the whole room a soft and intimate mood. There won’t be the chance to recreate it after tonight.</p><p>Aziraphale stands off the soft red carpet for now, waiting for Crowley to make the first move in order to introduce the matter as smoothly as he can during the fitting.</p><p>“Nice evening.” Crowley’s shoulders are a little more scrunched inwards than they usually are in their resting state, as if he were cold. <em>Nervous</em>, Aziraphale thinks, <em>he’s nervous, a bundle of jitters</em>.</p><p>He simply smiles at Crowley. He’s way too worried to make conversation now. God knows he’ll have to save his words for later.</p><p>Crowley takes the pair of trousers he’s come for from the usual valet stand and heads to the fitting room to take off those he’s wearing.</p><p>Aziraphale lets him go, of course, even though the urge to chase after him is strong. He’d like to say, <em>Look, here’s the thing, you’re the most important person in my life. I’m sorry I’ll be pushing you away, but it’s for the best. I couldn’t bear to know Gabriel might do something to you. And here’s why:…</em></p><p>But he is a professional. He intends to be one through and through, allowing his clients the privacy of changing at whatever pace they like. He ought to remember that, despite their… friendship, Crowley is still a customer. (But what’s the sense of this, so close to the end as they are? As much as he tries to keep these thoughts at bay, Crowley is not just a customer to him. He’s always been more than a customer, and more than a friend. Soon he won’t be either.)</p><p>Then Crowley clears his throat, coming out of the fitting room, sporting those not-quite-tight trousers, and Aziraphale snaps out of his musings.</p><p>Well, then. Everything seems to be ready. Only Aziraphale is not.</p><p>He takes his tiny glasses from one of the pockets of his jacket and puts them on, but he’s dismayed to find that they don’t come with additional courage.</p><p>Crowley steps on the carpet, barefoot, like the fitting requires. It’s one of those rare occasions in which he straightens his posture. Strange, how he looks different like this; looking ahead of him, but also shooting glances at Aziraphale from behind his sunglasses. Aziraphale doesn’t want to talk to him, not yet. He doesn’t want to start what will be their last conversation. In a masterful display of his typical cowardice, he gets to work, procrastinating the moment: work now, talk later.</p><p>Aziraphale notices what’s to fix at a glance, and falls down to his knees, gladly as usual, near the black fabric of those loose trousers, next to Crowley’s bare feet, on the soft, red carpet.</p><p>The pointlessly embroidered pincushion sits beside him on the stool, and Aziraphale spares a look of sympathy for it. He plucks out one pin after the other, pinches the fabric with a mastery he’s perfected over the years, as close as he can to Crowley’s leg, and applies them to mark points that will need to be tightened later. (What for, though? He’s not going to meet Crowley again after tonight. Still… he lets himself enjoy this weird proximity as long as he can. God knows he’s going to miss <em>this</em>, whatever it is.)</p><p>Crowley, in all of this, stays silent for a long while, perhaps absorbed in meditations of his own, perhaps watching him work – Aziraphale can’t tell; one way or another, he just cannot look at him from where he is. Crowley simply lets his trousers be pinned, patiently and meticulously; but with every passing second, it’s Aziraphale the one who feels pinned, under scrutiny, as if something is expected from him.</p><p>(Of course. Crowley is surely waiting for that explanation. He’s promised to tell him what’s wrong, yesterday evening.</p><p>The ever-present beast slithers up on him from his belly, breathing on his face. The lights in the shop cast the shadow of Crowley’s head onto Aziraphale. It’s funny and sad how, in all this inner turmoil, he still finds room in himself to feel anxious and ashamed.)</p><p>This silence is uncharacteristic for both of them. Aziraphale thinks he’s been spoiled by years and years of endless conversations on a merry-go-round of bistros and cafes and tiny restaurants and ice cream carts and, from time to time, in the summer, even plain sidewalks, where they shared boxes of takeaway food. Neither of them bothered if their hands got greasy, if more than once their fingers brushed as they took one chip after the other. Aziraphale has, as a matter of fact, meditated quite frequently on the surprising amount of indirect kisses their mouths have shared through those chips. Dipping a hand into the paper box, clumsily brushing fingers, finding a chip and taking it to the mouth, rinse and repeat. Mostly, though, they were both too deep in conversation to notice.</p><p>Tonight, those shared meals – overlapping, blurred and fragmented like a quick slideshow, but also unique for a detail or two – those meals already look like a precious memory from the past, something to sigh about wistfully when he’s alone. Aziraphale wishes he’d paid more attention to them, wishes he’d lived the moment fully and consciously, wishes he remembered even more than the many fragments he’s already collected.</p><p>Eventually, something prompts Crowley to clear his throat and break the silence, tearing Aziraphale’s early mourning veil and dragging him back to the here and now. “So what did you want to tell me? What did Gabriel tell you?”</p><p>Aziraphale sighs. Working on Crowley’s trousers had almost made him forget that he still needs to do this. There’s no way of tiptoeing around it now. The beast grins happily under his eyes as the anxiety mounts. “Well, he… he said it’s time to branch out further. I think he wants to start working with some VIPs, even.” He pauses, catching his breath as he plucks another pin. “Given everything, it’s highly likely that he’ll succeed in roping a few of them in.”</p><p>“And… that’s bad because…?”</p><p>“Crowley,” Aziraphale says, almost in pain. Where to start? He’s tried to put together a list of reasons last night, while he couldn’t sleep. Everything sounds pathetic now, in front of Crowley’s concern. “Well, f-for a start, he expects me to work overtime. And with that, I mean – constantly, more than I already do. And <em>he</em> will be the one taking all the customers’ measurements from now on. I’m to… I’m to stay in the back room.”</p><p>“So he wants to, what? T’start… doing what <em>you</em> do… out of the fucking blue? Just like that?”</p><p>“Yes.”</p><p>“B-… but what about that old lady? Your colleague, Mrs. What’s-her-name –”</p><p>“You mean Mrs. Nutter?”</p><p>“Yeah, yeah, her – I think she was giving you a hand, wasn’t she? Some afternoons a week, at least. Decent old lady, seemed to me.”</p><p>Aziraphale clenches his jaw; his movements gain momentum, becoming stiffer and stiffer at the same time. He’s never felt like this, tied at the front of a steam engine that he himself has launched at full speed. The rails will end, there’s going to be a canyon, and he’s going to fall into it willingly. He just doesn’t know when. Soon, though. Very soon. Too soon. “She – she finally retired some days ago. That’s why – that’s why Gabriel thinks he can take her place. Not just sewing buttonholes like she did, but… with all this hullabaloo.” He gestures briefly to the shop.</p><p>“Well,” Crowley says. Aziraphale, neck bent, eyes down, glasses on, close to Crowley’s cold feet on the carpet, is surprised by the lack of witty remarks, of soft sarcasm, of personal comments. “And what do <em>you</em> think about it?” Crowley asks instead. He always asks. Always, always. What a magnificent, inquisitive, innocent and curious soul.</p><p>Perhaps this is exactly the gentle push Aziraphale needed to spill the beans, because once he starts, he just doesn’t stop. “I think – I-I think he’s just being delusional. Because, you see – he’s never sewn anything, really. At all. He just, just <em>wanders</em> around the shop only when the customers are here, he talks to them, while I do the work, because you <em>know </em>he wants me to do all the work, Crowley, he just does. And now he thinks that he can do that too. I don’t know how he came up with this idea, but this means I’ll have to do my usual work in the back room, <em>and</em> the private fittings I already do to round up, <em>and</em> I’ll have to fix whatever the devil he’ll end up doing to those poor shirts and trousers – A-and it’s starting to be too much, Crowley, but it’s just that – this is my job, the one I’ve chosen to do. It’s my life.”</p><p>“Aziraphale,” Crowley tries to butt in, “Aziraphale, this is-”</p><p>The softness in his voice only makes Aziraphale’s hands work faster, pushing the pins in more forcefully, pushing the words out more urgently. “He, he also told me that, because of this VIP business, he… I need to – to pick carefully who I meet, from now on.”</p><p>“W-what?!”</p><p>“Yes… yes, he said that. Now, I – I don’t think he knows anything about our- our friendship, not to mention about our arrangement, but he says he’d like to monitor the people I hang out with in order to, uh, ‘build a brand’ – yes, that’s what he said. I gather he’d like to keep an eye on who I should and shouldn’t talk to, closer than he does now. He’s going to be at the shop way more often because of all this, and – and he suggested that he and I spend more time together to – to ‘show me how it’s done’. Whatever that means. So you see, between this and the amount of work I’m going to have, I’m afraid… I’m afraid our – our arrangement is over. I don’t think I’ll be able to meet you, after this. I can’t. But it’s not that I don’t want to – it’s just that I… I… You…”</p><p>Aziraphale’s hands are shaking so much that the pin he’s holding vibrates visibly, and as he tries to add it to Crowley’s trousers, he pricks his middle finger. It doesn’t really hurt, but he can’t remember the last time something similar has happened to him. The surprise makes him give a small “Ah!” while he looks at his pad in concern. The pin falls from his hand, landing on the carpet; it drowns without a sound in a red sea of soft cloth as Aziraphale takes his glasses off, putting them somewhere, and he starts nursing his finger, expecting to see a tiny speck of blood blooming on it. Nothing like that happens, though. Luckily it was just a superficial sting, and –</p><p>He raises his head, and there’s another surprise waiting for him. Crowley, beloved Crowley, suddenly on his knees like him and before him despite his trousers being fully tacked with pins, reaching out and taking Aziraphale’s hand in both of his.</p><p>Aziraphale has the vague, foggy impression that neither of them knows what they’re doing, but that deep down they <em>know</em> what is happening.</p><p>Beside this single thought, the shock has erased any resistance form Aziraphale’s mind. He registers the smooth texture of Crowley’s lean fingers, the shine of nails painted petrol green; the way Crowley’s hands carry his up into the light, his spine bending slightly to meet it halfway. And finally he registers thin, soft lips on his fingertip, while Crowley’s eyes flutter closed; the barest hint of a tongue, a brief suction that makes all nerve endings in Aziraphale’s brain shut down completely.</p><p>His ears are droning. He must be sweating. Breathing is difficult, all of a sudden. Has he just imagined everything? No, no – it’s all real – Crowley’s cradling his hand, his lips are still on his pad. Why?</p><p>He should pull his hand away. But he can’t. He doesn’t want to.</p><p>When Crowley’s lips leave his finger, he raises his head again, but without straightening his back. He’s still looking up from behind his sunglasses, still bowing down. Aziraphale feels, more than sees, thumbs brushing on his palm, back and forth and in small circles. It’s difficult not to look at them as they smooth their way into Aziraphale’s soul.</p><p>“Kissed it better,” Crowley says. He has the shy, hesitant smile of someone hoping to make a friend laugh and relieve some tension with an innocent joke.</p><p>Aziraphale stays there, dumbstruck. He doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do with himself; but perhaps he waits too long, because then Crowley’s hands leave his, and are gone. He already mourns the loss.</p><p>Aziraphale is aware that his own face must look confused, to say the least, because that’s how he feels; and, predictably, seeing his puzzlement, Crowley starts grimacing too.</p><p>After some struggling, he hears his own voice coming out low and whispery. “Oh, Crowley…” He’s almost begging him to understand something that is inexplicable even to himself, just using his words and his eyes. “Crowley… why did you do that?”</p><p>Crowley sighs, and he repeats, “Kissed it better, I hope.” There’s no trace of the shyness that was there a moment ago.</p><p>Some seconds pass, and Aziraphale lets Crowley elaborate an explanation. They’ve had unspoken, clear-cut boundaries until now. So why trying to rewrite the rules today, of all days?</p><p>Eventually, Crowley pulls further and further away from him very slowly. “Angel – whatever is bothering you, I… I can’t bear to know… that you feel… like this.” He makes a vague gesture that encompasses Aziraphale’s whole body. His nerves seem to have vanished, and now he simply looks tired and resigned. Aziraphale can’t tell which of those moods worries him more. “I can’t go on like this. I’ve been standing aside since you told me about Gabriel, and what he said to you the day after the first time we met, and also because I know how much this job meant to you. I’ve been standing at a distance for years. It was ok, I didn’t mind. I still had <em>you</em>. We had each other, somehow. Our friendship. But… just… now you’re pushing me away to keep a job that doesn’t bring you joy anymore. It hasn’t for too long. Not like it used to, or the way it could. And honestly, I… I just don’t understand.”</p><p>Aziraphale keeps looking at him, because he wouldn’t know where else to look. They’re both still on the carpet, and while he has decided to sit as properly as he can, Crowley is hunched forward, hugging his knees to his chest. His voice is somewhat muffled by his arms, but his words still manage to ring crystal clear and shake Aziraphale to the core.</p><p>“I’ve told you everything there is to know,” Aziraphale says, even though he isn’t sure his point has come across, and he tries not to panic at the prospect of having to explain himself again. He gulps. “Surely you see, now, why it’s not… why we can’t…”</p><p>Without realising it, he’s started passing his thumb idly on his own fingertip, where Crowley had just…</p><p>He laces his fingers together on his stomach to keep them from wandering.</p><p>“Angel, you…” Crowley sighs again, ignoring what Aziraphale has just tried to tell him. “I mean, even if we weren’t friends, I think you’d need – to stop this. Whatever the hell tells you that working yourself to death like you’re doing is the right thing, ’s just… not true. Not good for you. I’ve been watching you grow more and more tired lately. You wanna know what’s gonna happen, if you keep on like this?” He raises his head. “Gonna fall ill before you know it. That’s what.”</p><p>A shiver runs down Aziraphale’s spine as he notices the worry Crowley is barely concealing behind a reproachful tone. “I will manage,” he says. (Why does he feel like he’s climbing mirrors?) “I can, Crowley. You don’t know it.”</p><p>“Oh, I know enough, Aziraphale. Trust me, I – I know enough.”</p><p>“Really?” Aziraphale would like to sound crossed, or offended, but he realises that he’s actually just surprised and more than a bit curious. “About what?”</p><p>“About you.”</p><p>A long moment of silence follows.</p><p>While Aziraphale tries to make sense of it, Crowley’s hands rise to his hair, untying the ponytail and discarding the hair band somewhere. His fingers rub it at the roots as if to soothe a headache. Aziraphale recognises in some of those motions all the treatments Crowley has applied to his head, Thursday after Thursday in his salon. Something at the bottom of his stomach rouses and moves: a whirl of distress for Crowley’s discomfort, and a whirlpool of envy of Crowley’s hands, allowed to sink into those red locks, where Aziraphale’s fingers have never been.</p><p>He’s trying to formulate one of the questions that are crowding his mind when Crowley speaks again. “I’ve seen the dark circles under your eyes, lately. There they are, even now. I mean – how much sleep did you get last night? Or last week?”</p><p>Aziraphale stays silent. He can’t possibly counter anything to that, can he?</p><p>Crowley’s voice is very quiet now. “Just… you have to do something. You can’t endure all of that, all the time. No one can.” Then, quieter still, “I’m… I’m just worried about you.”</p><p>“It’s not that simple, Crowley,” Aziraphale says, about to fall headlong to the ground from the tightrope he’s walking on. He tries to take another step. “Gabriel would know about you and me, eventually. He could – could ruin you out of spite. He’s powerful enough-”</p><p>“Well, he could know about you and me even if you didn’t quit. And besides, he’s never told you anything like that – never explicitly talked about ruining anybody. Hasn’t he? He just made vague… allusions, yeah?” Crowley seems to reach for him, but then he just flails his hands uncoordinatedly. It’s almost painful to watch; Aziraphale could be doing the same, right now – he could be flailing like that, if he weren’t trying to hold himself together under the inquiring push of Crowley’s words. “I could bear being ruined. But I couldn’t bear knowing you don’t feel ok.”</p><p>Then, after a moment of hesitation, Crowley gains momentum again, and leans a little more towards him. “Ok, listen, angel. We could – we could work together. Just you and I. You could quit this shite of a job, fucking finally, and – and open your own shop close to where I work, down the street. How’s that sound? You could, I dunno, move into the shop above mine, even. You know it’s been empty for ages. We, we could-”</p><p>“<em>We</em> couldn’t do anything, Crowley. I’d still be too close to – to <em>here</em>. If I quit, it would look like a – a betrayal to Gabriel. I’d have no customers. He’d make sure of it.”</p><p>“You don’t know that! He can’t hold a needle, and he’s never threatened you with <em>ruin</em>, and–”</p><p>“<em>And</em>, he knows who you are, too. Remember the day after we met? When I told you that – that people like you would never be welcome here?”</p><p>“But I don’t fucking care what he may or may not think of – of ‘people like me’!”</p><p>“Well, If I quit and he ever saw the two of us together, he’d pull you with me in the gutter too. I told you, he’s powerful, Crowley. He has relations everywhere. You could lose your clients. You can’t possibly want <em>that</em>.”</p><p>“Then – ok, ok, if that’s what’s worrying you, then we could just go off together, yeah? We can say ‘fuck you’ to all of this mess and make a brand new start in the countryside. Or, or in the South Downs – my aunt Tracy, she- she’d love to have me back there. Been asking for me to move back south for a long time, actually. I’m sure she’d – she’d like you too… Everybody in the village would like you. We could open our shops side-by-side… Wouldn’t you like that?”</p><p>Aziraphale really wouldn’t like to stomp on Crowley’s dreams like that. The way he talks about them is so sweet and revealing, all rambling and gesturing – he’s clearly been thinking about them for quite some time, mulling them over under that red hair of his. It’s cruel, just cruel. But he can’t let him be this delusional when Crowley could tear down all that he’s been building for himself, working at the salon until today, just to keep meeting Aziraphale. Whoever does this for a friend, close as they may be? Who would throw to the wind a life of sacrifice without a second thought, without caring about the consequences?</p><p>They could still – well, they could <em>call</em> each other, sure. But meeting in person? Aziraphale can’t let Gabriel’s veiled threats drag Crowley down, not even if their chance of being true is only remote.</p><p>And so…</p><p>Aziraphale straightens his back. If he must rip off the plaster, better now than when it’s too late.</p><p>“Crowley, honestly, I… I don’t see why you’re so worried about me. It seems… excessive.”</p><p>This makes Crowley recoil. “What do you mean? I’m – I’m your friend, am I not?”</p><p>“Yes, but no one – no one up and leaves everything he has, his whole life, like <em>this</em> for another friend.”</p><p>Crowley clenches his jaw, a fighter through and through. “What if I <em>wanted </em>to do that anyway?”</p><p>“Oh, now, don’t be ridiculous, I…”</p><p>“<em>I’m</em> being ridiculous?” Crowley’s eyes shot open so much that they’re visible even behind his sunglasses, and Aziraphale understands he’s touched a sore spot. With a pang of regret, he realises that his last, desperate strategy to push Crowley away may be working. “Aziraphale. You… God. Why? Why are you making your life so difficult? Just… what for? Is it– is it about me? I- I mean. You could quit anyway. You– you don’t have to do anything with me, or for me, but just – Jesus…” He has his hands in his hair again, and this time they’re clenched so tight that Aziraphale fears he’s going to tear it out any moment. “Can’t – can’t you understand already – can’t you see that I… I–”</p><p>Crowley is quiet all of a sudden, trying to control his breathing.</p><p>Aziraphale feels as if a forbidden fruit that he didn’t even know existed were now at his fingertips. He doesn’t even have to reach out. He just needs to ask for it. The temptation of knowledge is too strong, and he gives in easily. “You… what? What <em>is</em> it that I don’t see, Crowley?”</p><p>Crowley makes a sound. It could be a laugh, it could be a sob. Then he takes a big breath, and speaks on. “B-bloody – oh, fuck. Angel, can’t – can’t you see that I’m in love with you?”</p><p>Silence falls between them, long and meaningful and full of expectation.</p><p>All the air in Aziraphale’s lungs has been sucked away from him, leaving room for new and slower breaths. His whole perception of the world starts to turn upside down while he sits completely still, and several missing pieces of Crowley’s puzzle fall into place.</p><p>The stubbornness of his concern for Aziraphale. The care and the soothing words he puts in his weekly free treatments. His habit of smoking his nerves away, dating way back to the time he came back to the shop after the job interview. His tight-lipped smiles and his silent support. The earnestness of certain answers during moments of mild drunkenness. The quiet willingness with which he’s accepted this arrangement from the start, weird and absurd as it was. Because, of course, Aziraphale now realises how absurd this whole situation has been since the very beginning. Has he really been this blind? Have they both been?</p><p>While Aziraphale’s mind is racing a mile a minute, Crowley gives a bittersweet laugh. “Well, there you have it,” he says, looking down. He buries his face in his arms, hugging his knees a little tighter, and Aziraphale hears him taking deep breaths to steady himself. Then he raises his head. “I just– just thought you ought to know it, at least. Since you seem so hell-bent on going on like this. ’M not gonna push you. And I didn’t want to drag my feelings into this whole thing because – well, I know that it– it only means complicating everything, but fucking Hell, if it’s been <em>difficult</em>-”</p><p>Aziraphale lets out a small, genuine laugh that stops Crowley mid-rambling. “My dear boy. This is… indeed, this is the most ridiculous situation.”</p><p>Crowley winces, and as he shakes his head, his hair sways all around him. Aziraphale follows its movements, drinks it all up, lock by lock. “Aziraphale,” Crowley says, “please. Don't start <em>now</em>, after all this time.”</p><p>“Start… start what?”</p><p>“Making fun of me. I give up. Just say ‘ok, I see, goodbye’ and… let’s be done with it, if that’s what you want. But, please, don’t laugh at me.”</p><p>The mere thought of mocking Crowley is enough to send shivers down Aziraphale’s spine. “I could never make fun of you, Crowley. <em>Not ever</em>. Actually… it’s the very contrary.” Something determined and persuasive in Aziraphale’s voice compels Crowley to look at him again. “It may come as a surprise to you, after how I’ve tried to push you away just now and for so long, but you see… I’m in love with you. I am. Truly, deeply. My dear Crowley – somehow, I feel I’ve never done anything else in my life but loving you. I love you like I’ve never loved anything else in my life. Not even my job. And especially not- not <em>this</em> job, in <em>this</em> shop at least, you are absolutely right.”</p><p>The anxiety monster has vanished into nothingness, leaving no trace. In its place, Aziraphale can hear the echo of the asteroid after the impact, reverberating through space and shaking his whole being; in the dust settling down after the earthquake, he starts to realise that, after all, he’s never been a lonesome planet orbiting around a sun. He’s always been one half of a binary star, two celestial bodies not quite touching, but tied together by forces bigger than both of them.</p><p>Crowley’s jaw has gone slack, and he’s silent. He’s so still that it doesn’t even seem like he’s breathing. There’s an unreadable expression behind his sunglasses. Whatever it means, now that Aziraphale has started talking, he has no intention to stop.</p><p>“I've been in love with you for – oh, for quite a while already. Years. But dates aren’t really what is important, right now. What I think is essential, and I’d like you to understand, is that, no matter what, I love you more and more each day. And I don’t regret it one bit.” He laughs quietly. “I couldn’t understand what you were trying to do just now – what you’ve done all this time for me. I couldn’t understand all your worry, your care, and how my decision distressed you so much more than I had anticipated. But now… what you’ve told me… finally, I <em>do</em> understand. And I’ve been so stupid not to realise it sooner.” There’s a brief pause. Aziraphale catches his breath; then he looks at Crowley’s face. “If… if you love me like you said – if you love me the way I love you, I… I’d be the luckiest man on this blessed earth if I could even – stay close to you, if and for as long as you wanted me to.”</p><p>A hopeful and incredulous tiny smile starts creeping its way on Crowley’s lips as Aziraphale speaks, like ivy making its way on the wall of an ancient, newly renovated house. Still, he doesn’t say anything, perhaps still shell-shocked by this turn of events.</p><p>Aziraphale himself, admittedly, is still giddy with the realisation that he didn’t have to worry about his unrequited and unprofessional feelings, after all. But this, he decides, is not a conversation to be had on the floor; so he stands up, and holds his hands out.</p><p>Crowley lifts his sunglasses at last, perching them on top of his head, among his hair. As Aziraphale suspected, he looks simply, positively, completely, utterly shocked. And yet, he’s still smiling; he looks up into his eyes, and after a moment, he places his hands in Aziraphale’s.</p><p>Crowley’s long fingers run like water on Aziraphale’s palms, and Aziraphale welcomes them like the desert sands waking up with the first blessed raindrops of a monsoon. Aziraphale closes his fingers around Crowley’s, tugging gently, and Crowley gets the hint, standing up in front of him.</p><p>The tension is still there, humming between them, but it’s of a different kind. <em>Everything</em> is different now. The knowledge that Crowley loves him back is as life-changing as the sun after a week-long rain. Crowley <em>loves him back</em>. Aziraphale could spend weeks, months, all his life wondering how on earth he hadn’t realised it yet, but he shrugs off the thought easily. It doesn’t matter; they can be together, and to hell with everything else. It all seems so inconsequential now. Every stupid excuse about Aziraphale protecting Crowley from his unprofessional feelings for him, pushing him away, Gabriel’s potential and petty revenge – all has thawed like snow in July, because <em>Crowley loves him back</em>. They will protect each other and have each other’s back. It could be far away from London, or perhaps in their shops here in the city, or in the countryside, or wherever – it doesn’t matter. They’ll be together.</p><p>Aziraphale savours this long-awaited moment tracing Crowley’s hands under his fingers. It feels like a lot of beautiful things – like finally drinking a big glass of water after running a marathon, or like coming home when it’s snowing outside – but he still can’t quite name the feeling yet.</p><p>All the careful touches he received from those blessed hands – the massages on his neck, the gentle scrubbing on his head, the tilting of his face to and fro to shave his cheeks; all the junk food and bottles of wines they passed one another, all the cigarettes Crowley’s held and smoked standing close to him, all the times his fingers have taken his sunglasses off before him – Aziraphale tries to print those memories back into Crowley’s skin, if only to share the wordless excitement of the moment. Those prominent knuckles that sometimes pop merrily like chestnuts on a fire, those smooth, multicoloured polished nails, the soft and narrow circles of those palms make Aziraphale’s thumbs tingle in happiness, and they graze lightly on every part of Crowley’s hands they can reach in a ceaseless migration while still holding them.</p><p>When he hears Crowley’s breath hitch a little, Aziraphale snakes both arms around his shoulders, looking into his eyes. Crowley’s hands fall at his sides, and they visibly twitch. “Still not sure about what I’ve told you, dear?” His fingers brush against Crowley’s hair on his back, and he can’t hold back a shiver. “I understand if you are.”</p><p>“Well, nnnh – I mean,” Crowley says, without concealing a cautious smile, “I wouldn’t mind some more reassurance. You have to admit it’s all… all been so sudden and unexpected. Hasn’t it?”</p><p>“Oh, my dear boy. Yes, this has certainly been unexpected for both of us… But sudden?” Aziraphale giggles lightly, daring to cup Crowley’s cheek. He is surprisingly warm, for one so thin. His cheekbone is as sharp as a blade under his thumb, and some locks of hair are still brushing his fingers with the touch of a feather. Aziraphale is shivering quietly, matching Crowley’s own trembling under his hands. He’s never felt lighter than in this moment. “I’m afraid this has never been sudden. Not at all…”</p><p>He takes Crowley’s hands once more, and guides them lightly on Crowley’s ribs, without ever breaking eye contact. “Thirty-four.”</p><p>On Crowley’s waist. “Twenty-nine.”</p><p>On Crowley’s hips. “Thirty-three.”</p><p>Crowley’s face lights up a little more with every movement of Aziraphale’s hands. It seems he can’t stop looking into Azirapahle’s eyes, and that’s fortunate, because Aziraphale can’t stop looking into his, either. “Angel, you… you remember them.” Their fingers twine together on his hips.</p><p>“Yes. I told you, it’s not sudden. It’s been a while.”</p><p>“A- a while?” Crowley is almost laughing now, in his bewilderment. Aziraphale can see the small crinkles at the corner of his eyes, his little regular teeth framed by a lopsided mouth and two dimples. They look like hard sweets, those teeth; like pebbles. Aziraphale loves them so much. He loves <em>everything</em> about this man so much. But, he surprises himself thinking, never, never too much.</p><p>“M-mh. I’ve known your measurements since that very first suit I made you, actually.”</p><p>Thank goodness that Aziraphale’s hands are still resting gently on his hips, because Crowley sways like he’s about to faint. “You… you’ve <em>always</em> known them?”</p><p>Aziraphale lowers his eyes and nods with a shy smile.</p><p>He looks up when he hears a puff of air coming out from Crowley’s mouth. A laugh. Crowley looks lost, as if he didn’t know what to say. He’s smiling, though, and this has to mean something. Finally he cups Aziraphale’s face in both hands, and he settles on a simple, “Gosh…”</p><p>Aziraphale laughs. The stubborn lightness he’s been feeling in his heart won’t go away. “Yes, love. Gosh, indeed.”</p><p>In the silence that follows, full of a new, thrumming energy, Aziraphale feels Crowley’s hands sliding down, tentatively – as if this still weren’t allowed – touching his neck, and then down, down on his shoulders, down on his chest.</p><p>Funny how, until now, Aziraphale hadn’t noticed how close their bodies and their faces are, breathing and sharing the same air, how their heads are tilted just so, how it’s so easy to close their eyes and let go. It takes a second, one single instant between a ‘before’ and an ‘after’.</p><p>Crowley’s lips land on Aziraphale’s. Barely there. Just a brush. Aziraphale doesn’t even think of moving away; he only feels softness, and gentleness, and warmth. He exhales a breath he’s been holding at the bottom of his soul for years, since he rescued a helpless redhead and his torn shirt on their way to a job interview at a salon further down the street.</p><p>He’s seen those lips turn deep red with wine, and cream white with vanilla ice cream; turn cold as Crowley sucked fruit juice out of ice lollies, and warm as they closed around cigarettes in the dark. He’s seen them open up in carefree smiles, and twist in sarcastic remarks. They have been regular guests in his mind, day and night, for such a long time that, whenever he thought about them long enough, he could almost guess what they felt like.</p><p>But now – now he can <em>tell</em> what they feel like. He has found the word he was looking for, the one pinpointing all the sensations that the skin-on-skin contacts with Crowley have been giving him since the very beginning. As his mind becomes wonderfully empty during many blissful seconds, only that one word remains.</p><p><em>Relief</em>.</p><p>“Oh, dear.” He pulls away a little, and Crowley tries to chase after him with smiling lips, but Aziraphale draws back, catching his breath.</p><p>“What's wrong?” Crowley says, panting a little himself, clearly halfway between amused and concerned. “Too… too fast?”</p><p>“Oh… oh, love. No. Well, not <em>exactly</em>.” Aziraphale’s hands are still on Crowley’s clothed hips. His fingers have started moving of their own accord, sliding idly on the cotton, and it would be easy, so easy to bunch up Crowley’s t-shirt, taking it out of those trousers full of pins and finally discovering just how warm his skin is there, how sharp is hipbones are, how welcome his hands would be. But – “It’s… I never thought it would be so difficult. Holding off, I mean.”</p><p>Crowley’s eyebrows dart up in understanding. He doesn’t say a word and lets Aziraphale speak.</p><p>“There is nothing in the world I’d like more than… being with you. Completely. Heaven knows how much I love you, and- and I think we – we deserve some happiness, after all these stupid years of misunderstandings. I know we’ve already wasted a lot of time. But I… would like to close all doors first, before… before we go on.” He sighs.</p><p>But Crowley, bless him, seems unable to stop smiling. He spreads his palms flat where they are, splaying his fingers on Aziraphale’s velvet waistcoat. “Tell you what, angel: I've been waiting for years. I’m sure waiting a little longer is not gonna kill me.”</p><p>Crowley brushes his lips against Aziraphale’s temple and forehead, soft and quiet and slow, as if he could read his mind by kissing him and he were afraid of doing something so big. Aziraphale gives a small laugh at the contact, and the warmth he feels on his cheeks spreads everywhere on him like ink in water. “We’ll take it slow, then,” he says. “Well, slower, at least, until – until very soon, actually. Since the biggest problem seems to be my job here, well… I could be a free man as soon as tomorrow evening.”</p><p>Crowley is all busy pressing his lips close to Aziraphale’s ear now, nuzzling his temple and humming who knows what into his skin, when something dawns on him and he draws back, opening his eyes. “Aziraphale Fell… are you… are you implying you’re gonna quit?”</p><p>Aziraphale nods. “Tomorrow,” he says again.</p><p>“<em>T-tomorrow</em>?” If Crowley were smoking now, Aziraphale is sure that he’d have thrown away his cigarette stub, just like he did when he first asked him if he wanted a suit, just like he did several times after then. Instead, he simply rests his forehead on Aziraphale’s.</p><p>“Yes. Tomorrow,” Aziraphale repeats for the third time. He can’t stop smiling. Neither can Crowley. All of this should be ridiculous, and maybe it really is, but he doesn’t feel the need to hide himself or to turn away or to explain anything. Not anymore.</p><p>Aziraphale cups his cheek again, stroking it gently with a thumb – a gesture that he’s discovering to like doing very much. “I’m going to do it for both of us. And then… well, we’ll see. But we’ll be free.”</p><p>Crowley’s hand comes to circle Aziraphale’s wrist, holding it tight. He’s still shaking, and Aziraphale is as well.</p><p>Crowley smiles, closes his eyes, and exhales.</p><p>This Friday wasn’t really doomsday, after all. It feels a lot more like the very first evening of the rest of their life, and Aziraphale can’t wait for the ones to come.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Thank you for all your support! We only have one chapter left and you *know* what's coming by now. :D<br/>I am currently writing the first draft of ch. 4 and I hope to have it ready in a couple of weeks. Let's keep being kind in the meantime! 🧡</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Chapter 4</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Finally, my friends, we earn the rating, just in time for the Long Long Last Chapter :D<br/>Enjoy these almost-12k words of spice and fluff!!! 🧡</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>4.</p>
<p>Aziraphale opens the door to his flat, hand in hand with Crowley. An exceptional Saturday evening, that one, after a day full of changes. Though he crossed the threshold out of Gabriel’s shop for the last time only an hour ago, it already feels like a distant memory; a thing from the past, to be dismissed with a shrug. The threshold he’s crossing now is a wide gateway to the future. He hasn’t stopped feeling light, so light that he could walk on water, like one of those tiny insects on a pond, happy to just let himself <em>live</em>.</p>
<p>His mind is already looking forward to the world beyond that gateway. For the first time in his life he is anticipating something, a very specific something – a house near the South Downs. They’ll move there together. It’s nothing concrete at the moment, of course; they’re just getting started, after all. But Crowley’s plan sounds reasonable; he’s phoned his Aunt Tracy during his lunch break, and she’s already offered to help them look for a nice little place. Her partner, Mr. Shadwell, is willing to help them renovate the place, if need be. As a payment, Tracy’s just going to ask for some company from time to time. The prospect of having regular Sunday lunches and going for walks all together, as a small family, is enough to make Aziraphale’s daydreams feel like a reality. His nose can already smell the invigorating sea air and the gentleness of seasonal flowers; his ears are full of waves rolling, sheep bleating, shoes making regular crunchy noises on gravelled paths, bare feet leaving silent prints on the beach behind them. His hand is and will always be in Crowley’s.</p>
<p>On their way to Aziraphale’s flat, they phoned to have some pizza and chips delivered, and by the time they make themselves comfortable, their order arrives. They take their shoes off and settle down on Aziraphale’s large and soft couch, without even bothering to get dishes and cutlery from the kitchen: they eat everything there, placing the boxes on their legs and on the seat, cutting and ripping slices bare-handed as they chat.</p>
<p>It’s all delicious, actually. The tomato sauce is fresh and well-spread, the mozzarella has melted to a perfect point, and there’s a nice amount of crunchy crust all around. The aroma, the texture and the taste of the pizza are absolutely mouth-watering. So are the chips’; and, as Aziraphale has discovered just yesterday with a kiss, so are Crowley’s.</p>
<p>Come to think of it, Aziraphale has never seen him eating with such dedication and enthusiasm, so much that he looks <em>happy</em> doing it. That’s new. Or, at least, unusual. Perhaps love and happiness make you quite hungry, he ponders as he smiles, and takes another bite into his own ripped-out slice.</p>
<p>As they talk, they share everything, opinions and secrets, flavours and morsels, to a level they’ve never experienced before. The closeness of having a meal in one’s own home, casually sitting next to the person you love the most in the entire universe, is something completely new to Aziraphale. It’s probably the same for Crowley too, given how excited and relaxed he seems at the same time. What a contrast from last night, really: Aziraphale lets himself be soaked in Crowley’s modern gibberish like a sponge, throwing in his remarks or observations from time to time, and all the while he notices that Crowley darts looks around the room.</p>
<p>Aziraphale has the sudden realisation that, in all those years, Crowley has never set foot into his house before, nor he in Crowley’s. Another thing to add to the new, exciting experiences on their list, another pointless cardboard wall that they’re tearing down bare-handed, ripping it apart like their poor pizzas. He can’t help wondering what Crowley’s own flat looks like. Clean and angular, if he has to take a guess, but not at all unwelcoming. Just like him. As for the colours – well, he hopes black isn’t too obvious a thought…</p>
<p>And somewhere in the distance, in the back of his conscious mind, he can hear the sound of a door turning on its hinges, opening onto a cottage where the sounds of the sea waves reach them easily. A new home.</p>
<p>During Crowley’s almost-incessant talking, a bit of tomato sauce has dribbled down his chin. Aziraphale smiles absent-mindedly, fond and incredulous as he hears Crowley talk of this and that, as the sea waves are still rolling in his mind with his voice. Without realising it or thinking about it, he reaches out and runs a thumb on the red spot, wiping the sauce away and taking it to his own lips; and only then does he snap back to the present moment. Crowley has stopped talking to watch his movements with an intensely focussed gaze, a look that Aziraphale recognises from their shared dinners and snacks and meals in restaurants or on the curb. Crowley is <em>watching</em> him (he’s watching <em>him</em>), and at last Aziraphale can guess what that look really means.</p>
<p>Shortly after, they move on from pizza to the chips, which are equally wonderful. Steamy, cheerful, crunchy outside, soft inside. Perfectly salted, just enough to enhance the mild flavour of fried potatoes.</p>
<p>Aziraphale is feeling brave tonight. He rarely ever has, to be honest; but tonight is for them, just for them. They can do whatever they like with no fear, no regret at all. They can do anything – even something as silly as taking a chip from the box and bringing it close to the other’s mouth, which will part easily with a smile. Placing the chip carefully inside, letting teeth and lips close around it, letting them graze with a bit of tongue on the fingers offering the food. Why not?</p>
<p>So Aziraphale does, just because it’s thrilling and exciting and doesn’t need words to explain this to anyone, not even to Crowley. In fact, he knows Crowley will understand.</p>
<p>As expected, as soon as he spots Aziraphale’s hand coming closer with a chip, he opens his mouth, just enough to receive it on his tongue. His lips smile smugly when Aziraphale’s hand pulls away. He closes his mouth, licks his lips and munches without hurry.</p>
<p>Once he swallows, Crowley gazes at him. “Can I have another?”</p>
<p>Amused, Aziraphale huffs a breath out; then he takes another chip, shorter and thicker than the first one, and repeats his offering. Crowley’s mouth closes on his fingertips with what to Aziraphale looks like greed.</p>
<p>It really doesn’t take long before Crowley gulps and asks, “Another. Please?” And how can Aziraphale deny him? More than that – it’s not that he can’t, he doesn’t want to. So he takes a couple of chips, and Crowley leans closer to eat them too, meeting his hand halfway this time. There’s probably too much tongue involved in the operation, but Aziraphale doesn’t find anything to complain about it, as he watches Crowley’s jaw moving and chewing once he retreats his fingers.</p>
<p>When he’s finished, Crowley moves all the boxes to the floor, takes his sunglasses off his loose hair and places them on the coffee table nearby. “I’ve had enough of appetisers.” He leans in to lick the salt off Aziraphale’s lips. Their lips meet and, just like that, they’re kissing again.</p>
<p>Aziraphale immediately cups Crowley’s jaw and pulls him closer by a fistful of his shirt. Crowley tilts his head, slotting their lips even more perfectly, and Aziraphale gasps. The kiss deepens as his tongue finds Aziraphale’s; Crowley tastes like chips, obviously, but he also tastes sweet and curious in a way that only <em>he</em> can.</p>
<p>And thank goodness Crowley’s had the good sense of moving the empty cartons on the floor, because Aziraphale gives in to the need to tug at his sky blue shirt – the first one he’s ever sewed him; closer, closer, to lean back and drag Crowley forward until he’s completely sprawled onto him, and to cage his waist (<em>Twenty-nine</em>) between his thighs, and to kiss his face all over, and then to twist his neck a little, brushing his lips against Crowley’s throat, feeling the blood roar and run a hundred miles a minute under his skin, grazing his teeth against an ear and discovering, when he gives a little laugh, that Crowley’s just a bit ticklish there.</p>
<p>Crowley, for his part, seems to be completely invested in making it good, whatever this thing they’re doing is. They’re completely improvising, and perhaps that’s what makes it amazing. None of this was planned: not only the pizza and the chips, but the whole being together, like this, so close and so simply, with all the time in the world ahead of them. There are so many things they could do. This is only the beginning.</p>
<p>Crowley props himself up on his forearms, and starts moving his hips very slowly, and oh Lord. Oh <em>Lord</em>. Aziraphale has to clasp one of his shoulders. The friction is just this side of maddening, despite all the layers of fabric that are still between them. Especially because one of Aziraphale’s hands has apparently flown to cup one of Crowley’s buttocks, spurring him, and this is making Crowley make all sort of little sounds against his neck.</p>
<p>Eventually, though, before anything else can happen, Crowley slows down and rests there, on top of Aziraphale. As they both pant, trying to regain some composure after getting each other so worked up, Crowley’s fingers curl lightly around his neck, like they’ve done so many times already over the years during his massages.</p>
<p>Aziraphale smirks, and rearranges them both so that he’s once again sitting up, with Crowley straddling him. His hands are still on Aziraphale’s neck, his fingers brushing lightly at the sides and twirling a lock of hair on his nape once or twice. Tiny shivers run all over Aziraphale, as if he were cold and not warm all over.</p>
<p>“So?” Crowley has decided to brush Aziraphale’s throat with his thumbs, right next to his Adam’s apple, that small spot just above the collar of his shirt and his bow tie; he’s gazing at him as if he were studying him, and isn’t that <em>something</em>? Aziraphale gulps, noticing how Crowley’s mouth is still so very near, waiting for permission to land on him in every possible way all over again. “How’d it go today?”</p>
<p>Because of course they still haven’t talked about what happened. They have all the time in the world, after all.</p>
<p>Truth be told, there’s not much to tell, though Aziraphale is still processing what he’s done and how easy it’s been. He’s still smiling at the idea, at the <em>enormity</em> of freedom in front of him now, at his complete disposal. “It went very smoothly, I’d say. As smooth as… as water sliding off, uhm…”</p>
<p>“Ducks?” Crowley comes to his aid.</p>
<p>Aziraphale laughs. “Why ducks?”</p>
<p>Crowley shrugs with a smile. “Dunno. First thing that came to my mind. Could have also said, well… umbrellas.” Dear Lord, if he’s sweet.</p>
<p>Aziraphale pecks him on the cheek, because he deserves it. “Well, anyway, it is over. I quit.”</p>
<p>Crowley arches his eyebrows and makes an ‘Oh!’ with his mouth, nodding wisely. But it looks like he can barely contain his excitement himself, and it’s so lovely to see him like this, to have him this close. “Was it difficult?”</p>
<p>Aziraphale shakes his head. “Not really. And – he – Gabriel, he was actually disappointed, of course, and a little crossed, but… he just had to let me go. There’s still some paperwork to do, but I can say it’s over.” He rests his head on Crowley’s chest. He finds a heartbeat there and lets himself be lulled by it for a bit, wishing time could stop right now and leave them like that. “I don’t know why I was so scared.”</p>
<p>“Too much pressure, perhaps.” Crowley rubs slow circles on his back with a hand while he cradles the back of his head with the other. Aziraphale feels his body relax. He doesn’t even let himself be embarrassed when he admits that Crowley’s touch feels like the best medicine, thick and fresh like mint syrup. He feels himself breathe with every brush of his fingertips. “I’ve been telling you that you work too much for a long while, now.”</p>
<p>“You have.” He draws back a little and pecks the tip of Crowley’s nose. How he wishes he’d listened to him sooner… He could have quit years ago. But it’s not important, now.</p>
<p>“So you’re feelin’ better tonight?”</p>
<p>“Oh, dear. I’ve never felt better in my whole life.”</p>
<p>“Well, then, that’s an improvement if I ever saw one.”</p>
<p>“M-mh.” Aziraphale tilts his head a little and purses his lips. He feels so giddy, so out of his mind with happiness that he fears it’s making him look a little foolish. Actually, he doesn’t mind at all. Surprising even himself, his voice sounds somewhat mischievous as he says, “Do you think it could get any better than this?”</p>
<p>Crowley snorts, and leans down to lay his smile on Aziraphale’s neck. “I have a few ideas.”</p>
<p>Aziraphale laughs and, as he stands up from the couch, he lifts Crowley up by the bottom. Crowley yelps with a delighted and surprised sound, circling his shoulders with his arms. His ankles lock on Aziraphale’s lower back, with his legs sinking a little around his waist for support.</p>
<p>They move (or, rather, Aziraphale moves them both like that) to Aziraphale’s bedroom, half-kissing, half giggling.</p>
<p>Once they’re in front of the bed, Aziraphale lets Crowley put his feet on the floor. The door stays open, but neither of them cares or notices. As they kiss, nothing matters beside their breaths, warm against each other’s cheeks; the way their noses press lightly into the sides of their heads; the way their fingers move through their hair; the way their whole bodies sway towards each other, gravitating and almost colliding with gentle movements, a dance betraying years of hidden desire and unfathomable attraction suddenly able to trickle through.</p>
<p>Quite a lot of things to notice at once; but Aziraphale has spent so much time imagining all this, that now he is only filling in the details.</p>
<p>Crowley has taken the time to change after his own shift at the salon before coming to pick Aziraphale up at the tailor shop. The shirt Aziraphale sewed him, the very first one, all those years ago, still fits him perfectly.</p>
<p>Seeing the sky blue fabric sliding on his slim arms and his narrow chest is already mouth-watering enough to make Aziraphale’s heart stutter. And yet he’s never felt more confident as he kisses him with insistent, brief, happy press of lips against lips. Crowley laughs seeing his eagerness and Aziraphale takes the chance to nibble at his bottom lip, very lightly. The amused laugh morphs into a gasp in an instant, and Aziraphale sees those magnificent eyes darken ever so slightly, but steadily, a shade that surely matches that of his own gaze.</p>
<p>Speaking of clothes… Crowley’s hands slide down from his shoulders with meditative slowness. His fingers grab the soft lapels of Aziraphale’s jacket and stroke them reverently. “How long does it take to sew one of these?”</p>
<p>Aziraphale clears his throat. “Well, it depends. Several days, at least. Weeks, even.”</p>
<p>Crowley hums in appreciation. He seems to be considering something, and eventually he comes to a decision.</p>
<p>“I think… I think we don’t need this.” He tugs Aziraphale’s jacket. “Or this.” The bow tie becomes but a strip of fabric in his hands, and he puts it on a chest of drawers. “Or this.” He strokes his waistcoat. “Or this.” His fingers skim lightly the collar of Aziraphale’s white shirt.</p>
<p>Even after he stops talking, Crowley’s fingers keep roaming on Aziraphale’s clothes. They rest on Aziraphale’s belly for a long time, and he bends down to kiss it, and kiss it, and kiss it, with slow strokes of his lips against the velvet. “I can’t say I disagree,” Aziraphale concedes, running a hand on his cheek. Crowley looks up and bites his lip. Dear God… he’s a tempter born and raised. Luckily, Aziraphale <em>can</em> give in and nibble that lip, like he’s done not long ago. He can do whatever they both like, can touch Crowley how ever Crowley likes to be touched. So he does: he pulls Crowley back up and nibbles the same place where Crowley’s small teeth have been not two seconds ago. Crowley hums, after another lock of lips. “I think you’d better take this jacket off. Don’t you?”</p>
<p>And isn’t it endearing, the way Crowley is always offering, but never pushing? “Whatever you say, dove.” He swallows. “If you’re sure… why don’t you do it yourself?”</p>
<p>Crowley seems a little taken aback, but then he smiles.</p>
<p>So Aziraphale lets himself be disrobed of his jacket: first one sleeve, then the other. It falls silently on the floor. “Leave it,” Aziraphale says at once, noticing that Crowley is about to bend down and pick it up. “There will be time.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(Crowley has come to know many things in the last twenty-four hours.</p>
<p>First of all, he knows of Aziraphale’s love for him. He knows just how soft his lips are, how soft his waist, how warm his hands. He knows the sparks travelling on his skin whenever Aziraphale touches him, and he knows that, in a way, nothing has changed. They’re just deepening a bond that has always been strong, made of shared moments and mutual support.</p>
<p>But Crowley still doesn’t know many others things; not yet, at least. For instance, he doesn’t know there’s going to be a house where they'll live together, where their new life will start to take roots. He doesn’t know of the many things that, in the end, <em>will</em> come true. They’ll find themselves on the dark sheets of his own bedroom in his London flat, a peaceful Sunday morning a week or so from today. It’s the first time Aziraphale sleeps and wakes up there – a beacon of light in a sea of dark fabric.</p>
<p>After the chaotic lovemaking of the night before – Crowley riding Aziraphale as if in a frenzy, Aziraphale touching him in time with his movements, the sounds, the mess, the warmth, all of it – it’s almost weird how everything is quiet and peaceful. There’s no rush; there’s only Crowley watching the light as it envelops Aziraphale’s head from his back, mouth slightly parted and full rosy cheeks like a real cherub, bless him. His light snoring has subsided sometime during the night, and now he’s breathing slowly and evenly in his sleep.</p>
<p>Aziraphale stirs under his gaze, and his eyes crack open, watching him with some surprise and a barely-there smile.</p>
<p>Crowley reaches out and brushes his knuckles against his cheek. The skin is so soft there, it’s almost unbelievable. He smiles. “Hello, love.” Aziraphale has decided that he’ll grow a beard, but it’s still a resolution more than a reality, and Crowley can enjoy the smoothness for a little while longer.</p>
<p>Aziraphale, too, reaches out, and brushes a long lock of hair out of Crowley’s face. “Hello, love,” he echoes.</p>
<p>Crowley feels so happy that he doesn’t know what to do with it, initially. Then he settles on scooting up close, wrapping his arms around that soft waist and holding him as tight as he can under the dark covers.</p>
<p>Aziraphale’s breath hitches in surprise.</p>
<p>“’M not letting you go anytime soon, y’know,” Crowley mumbles into his collarbone. “You better get used to this.” Only then does Aziraphale hold him back and, with a relieved sigh, they both drift off again and sleep the Sunday morning away.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>With the next kiss, Aziraphale starts unbuttoning Crowley’s shirt in turn, from the top down. Crowley’s fingers are hooked on the lapels of his waistcoat and are tugging just enough to state how he likes to feel the worn-out velvet on his skin, but also how he can’t wait to discover what’s beneath it.</p>
<p>Button after button, though, the kisses become more frantic, until Crowley’s shirt is completely open revealing a taut canvas of skin. By that time, Aziraphale’s hands and lips jolt back to Crowley’s face, and while Crowley makes quick work of the waistcoat and the white shirt underneath it, Aziraphale opens his mouth, immediately mirrored by Crowley. Their tongues meet, and Aziraphale feels that sense of relief again; he tastes no nicotine, only him, only Crowley, pure and unadulterated. The thought alone makes stars twinkle behind his closed eyes.</p>
<p>As they kiss lazily, savouring the moment and each other, Aziraphale discards both waistcoat and shirt in one go with Crowley’s help, leaving him only in an undershirt concealing his lightly fuzzy chest and his soft stomach. His hands resume the exploration of Crowley’s body, losing themselves on it. His fingertips roam freely before deciding to land on his chest (<em>Thirty-four</em>) and slide down to his waist (<em>Twenty-nine</em>). Crowley breaks the kiss to latch himself onto Aziraphale’s collarbone, sucking slowly but decidedly. Aziraphale makes what can only be described as a <em>sound</em>, and his fingers dig more firmly into Crowley’s waist.</p>
<p>Good heavens, his whole body is perfect. Aziraphale just can’t get enough of him. Crowley has some nice chest hair that looks perfect for being petted or gently ruffled; his nipples are a darkish shade of pink, and – Aziraphale notices – very sensitive, judging by Crowley’s delectable little moans into his neck when his fingers graze them as he explores. All points that he intends to study thoroughly and methodically in a little while. And when Crowley’s shirt falls to the floor, pushed by Aziraphale’s hands, he’s reminded of his lightly fuzzy forearms. Now that he can touch them, he can confirm that they’re as soft as they look, if lean, like the whole lot of Crowley.</p>
<p>Aziraphale takes a moment to admire him and breathe him in. Then, with sudden determination, he grabs the hems of his own white undershirt and peels it off over his head, matching Crowley’s state of undress.</p>
<p>“Oh, angel,” Crowley says, and he’s so earnest and his eyes are so amazed and reverent that he looks about to cry. Instead, Crowley just slides his fingers around Aziraphale’s chest, and then lower on his waist, mirroring Aziraphale’s previous motions. A big smile lights his whole face up like a neon light as his hands close on his love handles and start fondling them gently.</p>
<p>“You’re so beautiful,” he says. Just like that.</p>
<p>Aziraphale kisses him, and he doesn’t even bother trying to hide the blush spreading on his cheeks as well. “You too, love. You’re just plain gorgeous.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(Crowley doesn’t know they’ll share wet, sloppy, open-mouthed kisses, lying on the matching blankets of a narrow old couch; his legs are locked around Aziraphale, drowning in that yielding, buttery waist, while the end credits of a quickly-forgotten film roll on TV. Aziraphale tastes of popcorn and anticipation, of angel and of happiness; and though Christmas is only a few days away, it feels like it’s come early for the two of them.</p>
<p>The fireplace near the telly is still burning and popping with glee, providing a louder counterpoint to their gasps. As they rock slowly against each other, they share cheesy smiles that make them laugh, pausing their kisses to catch their breath. Then they resume their movements with more dedication, until the holly-printed pyjama bottoms and the ultra-tight red boxers become a nuisance and they get pulled halfway down in a haste; Aziraphale takes hold of both their cocks and Crowley's hand closes over his in a flash, and they fuck their joined fists and they kiss until they swallow each other’s cries, making a mess of their nightwear and their stomachs.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Crowley’s fingers haven’t stopped skimming Aziraphale’s body wherever they can reach. Even now, as he keeps exploring the plains of Aziraphale’s skin suddenly accessible to him, and as his eyes darken a little and his breath gets uneven when he touches Aziraphale’s soft sides and belly, he always looks cautious. As if he didn’t want to ruin this moment, like a snowflake in the sun.</p>
<p>Quite frankly, Aziraphale, too, is now completely absorbed in studying the way Crowley’s body reacts to his touch. Crowley’s breath catches in his throat and he tries to stifle a moan when Aziraphale brushes the flat of his fingernails on his nipples; he closes his eyes and anchors himself to Aziraphale’s hips for support, as if his legs were giving out. Yes, definitely <em>very</em> sensitive, then.</p>
<p>While Aziraphale touches him, the pink flush on Crowley’s face starts pouring down, flowing to his chest. Aziraphale watches his ribcage as it moves, expanding and contracting with deep breaths and sharp exhales in a peculiar rhythm. He can feel the bones of his back, his shoulder blades in particular. He’s always been drawn to those shifting planes hidden under Crowley’s shirt that he noticed right when they first met. They’re sharp, and solid, and frame the centre of his back with scientific precision, guiding Aziraphale’s hands lower. His fingers find two small valleys, just above his waistline, two dimples that he indulges tracing and filling with his thumbs. And when he takes a hand between their bodies again – when he brushes his knuckles against the dark red trail of hair below his navel, when his fingers circle it and dip lower, catching in the belt loops of his tight trousers – he can feel a shiver on Crowley’s stomach.</p>
<p>“I’d like to take these off, if you’re agreeable,” Aziraphale says, tugging the loops ever so slightly.</p>
<p>Crowley gulps audibly, then he nods. “A-agreeable. Yes, yes – very agreeable, sure.”</p>
<p>A button is unfastened, and they look into each other’s eyes. Aziraphale takes Crowley’s hands and guides them to his own trousers. “Please.”</p>
<p>And Crowley mirrors him with slow motions, careful, as if he were afraid of shaking too much, freeing the button of Aziraphale’s cream trousers from its hole.</p>
<p>A zip is lowered, followed by another one, and somehow they’re still looking into each other’s eyes. Taking turns at kneeling at each other’s feet, like knights making an oath, one after the other they remove their socks. Two pairs of trousers fall gently to the floor with soft thuds, together with Aziraphale’s comfortable tartan boxers and Crowley’s white slips. They step out of them, leaving them where they are.</p>
<p>It’s really just them, now. Nothing else in-between – just this fizzling, exciting force driving them closer.</p>
<p>As he admires Crowley’s body with a sudden flare of renewed desire, very different from the gentle need that took him through the whole evening, Aziraphale allows himself to follow his instinct and makes to drop down to his knees like he’s done so many times already in the shop.</p>
<p>But Crowley stops him, encouraging him with gentle hands to stand back up and sit on the edge of the bed instead. And then, to Aziraphale’s surprise, <em>he</em> is the one to drop to his knees. He starts rubbing circles with his thumbs just above Aziraphale’s feet, then up into his calves, and again higher, kissing his knees, stroking the smooth skin behind them.</p>
<p>Aziraphale lets Crowley do whatever he feels like, even though every touch is sending tiny sparks in every cell of his body. Crowley’s gentle ministrations are tenfold more affecting than he was expecting, and as he bites his lip to try to keep some self-control, he realises holding off is starting to be a challenge.</p>
<p>Aziraphale knows how to savour a moment, though; he’s been savouring for years every instant he’s ever spent with Crowley. He’s a true master of this art. So he steadies himself with a deep breath and he keeps waiting, enjoying this moment. He’s struck with the sudden realisation that tonight will be one of the memories he’ll be replaying over and over again in his mind as long as he lives, until the details fade away and only the taste and the feel of it remain.</p>
<p>Crowley grabs generous handfuls of his thighs, stretching his fingers wide and kneading them with a focus that can’t hide the way his breath, too, is shaking. Then he looks up. It seems he knew exactly he would find Aziraphale staring back, because he looks very serious, so much that he doesn’t even blink, and Aziraphale is immediately hypnotised. He feels his whole weight gravitating down towards Crowley, like he’s done all his life. It also seems that Crowley is in the process of deciding something, and the best course of action is just to wait for what he’ll do. So Aziraphale waits.</p>
<p>After some seconds of silence, Crowley darts a hand behind Aziraphale’s neck, like a snake striking its prey, and pulls him down in a kiss.</p>
<p>The best part, Aziraphale reasons as he drinks up Crowley’s gasps one by one and offers his own in return, is that, despite the wave of passion crashing repeatedly onto them, they both know they don’t have to rush through any of this. They have time, all the time in the world. So they stay like that for a while, despite the unusual and potentially uncomfortable position: Aziraphale is almost folded in half, bowing down from the bed, cupping Crowley’s cheeks now steadily, now just with his fingertips; and Crowley answers his every touch, sitting on the floor between Aziraphale’s legs, tilting his head up and sideways to kiss him deeper, a hand on his thigh and the other on his nape.</p>
<p>Eventually Aziraphale sits up and tugs Crowley’s arms, scooting back on the bed. Crowley lets himself be guided and he flops down onto his thighs, straddling him like he had done on the couch in the living room; with the only exception that this time they’re both naked, but they’re still very much in love. Aziraphale can feel it in the way they can’t stop looking at each other, in the way their hands seem to have a life of their own, roaming freely and without stopping half a minute.</p>
<p>No, they really aren’t rushing anything here. And it doesn’t feel slow, either. They’re going exactly at the right speed.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(Crowley doesn’t know he’ll rest with Aziraphale on a chequered blanket among the grass and the flowers of a countryside meadow, lazing on a Sunday afternoon not too far in the future. They’ve eaten all sorts of delicacy during their picnic, and now Crowley is sprawled on the blanket, face down, playing games on his phone; Aziraphale is sitting close, reading (or re-reading) one of his Jane Austen books and making small noises in reaction to the plot.</p>
<p>After a while Aziraphale puts his book down. Crowley looks up from his phone and he sees a light, hopeful indecision in his eyes. He waits. He’s always waited, because he has found that waiting is often the right move when it comes to Aziraphale.</p>
<p>And predictably, he speaks.</p>
<p>“Can I…” He trails his fingertips in Crowley’s hair, which is loose and a bit messy on his shoulders today, his sunglasses folded neatly inside the picnic basket. He clears his throat. “Can I braid it?”</p>
<p>Crowley laughs quietly. “Oh, angel, angel… I never thought you wanted to switch jobs. Such a sudden decision.” Despite his teasing, his voice is low and warm.</p>
<p>“Oh, you.” Aziraphale laughs and pats lightly on his shoulder. But Crowley can see his faint blush, the coy way he lowers his eyes, and may someone strike him down if it isn’t as fetching and lovely as the first time he saw it, when he met that kind soul all flustered and eager to help him with his shirt, just because he <em>could</em>.</p>
<p>Crowley chuckles, discarding his phone somewhere on the blanket and tucking his chin on his forearms. He closes his eyes. “Gonna steal my job, you, one day, and open your own salon, ’s what you’ll do. Go ahead, then.”</p>
<p>Aziraphale hums noncommittally, shuffles closer behind him and starts combing his hair with his fingers. He pets it repeatedly, slowly, until there’s not a single hair out of place. Then he splits it into three even sections. Crowley lets him do as he pleases, calm and carefully: one section over the second, and the third one over the first one, and the second one over the third one, and round and round…</p>
<p>Aziraphale’s fingers work on his hair at their own pace. Crowley can see them in his mind’s eye, rearranging it and moving lower, flexing a little to change position and sliding the locks between them.</p>
<p>Crowley breathes out. This hair-braiding thing is a slow, relaxing process. This is where happiness hides: inside the fluttering of gentle fingertips on his head, as light as butterflies, as hard-working as ants or bees. Insignificant, quiet moments that he’ll remember in the future, when they’re both grey and slow and still in love.</p>
<p>Clouds roll by over them, birds share one or two different tunes from the branches of nearby trees. Even though these relaxing seconds seem to last forever, Crowley feels Aziraphale’s hands laying his hair down on his neck, now arranged in a single, loose braid. “There,” Aziraphale says, shuffling again in front of him. “Not quite like the one you had the day we first met. But I’ll try my best to get better… after all, one has to start somewhere, right?” He hesitates a moment before tearing a long blade of grass, tormenting and twisting it nervously in his fingers.</p>
<p>Aziraphale hasn’t been this shy in quite some time, and this tickles Crowley’s curiosity. He props himself up to peck his upturned nose. And dear God, his heart swells so much at Aziraphale’s gentle blush that Crowley fears it could burst any moment now. As the braid falls down over one of his shoulders, swaying gently, Crowley runs a hand through Aziraphale’s white-gold halo, twirling a curl around a finger.</p>
<p>Aziraphale sighs. His lips are stretched in a smile so shy and so happy that it’s making his eyes glisten suspiciously. Only then does Crowley notice that he hasn’t been tormenting that poor blade of grass. Not exactly; he’s shaped it in a small circle, tying two ends together in a tiny, careful knot.</p>
<p>When Crowley meets his eyes again, they are so wide and blue, in the bright half-shadow under the branches of the tree, that he feels all the air leaving his lungs. Slowly, shaking, Aziraphale takes Crowley’s hand while holding the grass ring in the other. “Crowley, love… Please, marry me.”</p>
<p>And instead of doing something completely stupid, like – like fainting, Crowley wears the grass ring and launches himself to kiss him, and they kiss and kiss and kiss right there, in the meadow, among the flowers, rolling around off the blanket, in the warm late spring sun.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>They’re still panting when Aziraphale reaches out with his right hand slowly, and even more slowly he spreads out all his fingers on Crowley's chest. He doesn’t know exactly why he’s doing it, but everything he expected to find is there, even though he can’t see it. Skin. A very thin layer of fat. Muscles. Ribs. And inside them – a heartbeat, fluttering against his palm, as loud as if Crowley’s heart were pressed right against his hand.</p>
<p>"I..." he says, and his laugh is soft and incredulous, like he's just touched a miracle. In a way, it’s exactly so. "I can feel you."</p>
<p>"Yeah." Crowley smiles. His eyes twinkle and his hand mirrors Aziraphale's on his much softer chest. "And I, you."</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(Crowley doesn’t know there will be a sunset on a solitary beach, somewhere in the south of Europe; perhaps in Spain, during a warm summer. There will be the sun kissing his skin, its orange and yellow and red rays painting everything around him. He will be facing the sea and the relentless motion of the waves, on his hands and knees on a soft beach towel; and behind him there will be Aziraphale, a hand on his hip, the other wrapped in his hair, gently. There will be no one else.</p>
<p>The seagulls screech and soar, gliding high above them, but they’re far away; they won’t land anywhere near to disturb. Just a few feet away, the tide and the undertow sing their gentle lullaby made of water and foam. They don't bother being silent; and neither do Aziraphale and Crowley. As the sun sinks below the horizon, Aziraphale sinks into him with long careful movements. Again, and again, and again…</p>
<p>A lovely breeze comes from the sea, tickling Crowley’s nostrils; he gasps, and his lungs fill with salty air. His hands curl into fists on the towel, and he pushes back as slowly as Aziraphale’s thrusts encourage him to do, drawing out these never-ending, long-awaited moments – the central days of a hot summer that will inevitably slide into the sweet nostalgia of autumn.</p>
<p>Little by little, Aziraphale pulls Crowley's hair until he tilts his head back, his jaw goes slack and a shaky groan makes its way out of his mouth. Words have deserted him long ago, but it really doesn’t matter. They both know how far they can go and how much they can take and give.</p>
<p>“There you go, love,” Aziraphale says between a moan and the next. “I wish I could kiss your throat right now…” His languid thrusts are melting Crowley’s joints from the inside like ice cream, and he can only push back hoping to get even more.</p>
<p>“’M close,” he gasps, or at least he thinks he does. But Aziraphale must have heard him, because Crowley feels the angle inside him changing and a kiss landing between his shoulder blades. The hand on Crowley’s hip moves to his chest, supporting him and brushing his nipples in a way that will always make Crowley’s breath hitch and his voice keen.</p>
<p>Crowley doesn’t need any other encouragement to come. It happens naturally – like the sun going to sleep under the sea, like Aziraphale following him right after with a sigh.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>When their heartbeats calm down, Crowley moves both their hands away from their chests and closes the distance between them with a hug.</p>
<p>"Y're… so soft…" he mumbles into his shoulder. If Aziraphale didn't know him so well, he couldn't notice the hue of wonder and awe in his words. It's there, though, and Crowley is holding him tight like he's always dreamed of.</p>
<p>From the tangle of limbs they’re in, Crowley resumes touching him, stroking his back and kissing down his neck. His hips start making small, aborted little movements, and their erections brush together, making both of them gasp. Crowley tightens his legs around Aziraphale’s waist, and then he’s rubbing himself on Aziraphale’s stomach, still with a hand on his back to anchor himself and keep him close.</p>
<p>“Crowley, love,” Aziraphale babbles, but as soon as he feels a thumb brushing his slit – almost teasing at first, and then drawing slow circles and spreading precome – he gapes silently and closes his eyes for several blissful moments, forgetting whatever he was going to say.</p>
<p>Crowley peppers his throat with kisses, small and almost imperceptible brushes of lips, and he wraps his hand around Aziraphale. The way his spindly fingers encircle and fit around him, almost like a shield or a protection, makes Aziraphale’s head spin and his heart skip a beat every three. He can’t help making tiny, needy noises, and they would be very embarrassing if they didn’t make Crowley smile, adjusting and doubling his efforts in answer.</p>
<p>Aziraphale closes his eyes and rests his forehead on Crowley’s shoulder as they both keep grinding and moving. The amount of sensations piling up starts to feel a little surreal, almost as if Aziraphale were having a vision.</p>
<p>Crowley is all absorbed in his task of, predictably, pushing Aziraphale as close to the edge as he can. From his quick, heavy breaths, he sounds like he can barely keep from doing who knows what, like he’s exactly as dazzled by Aziraphale’s squirming and flex of hands on his thighs as Aziraphale is by the sound of his voice and the slide of his palm on him. Aziraphale is not going to last much longer if Crowley keeps this up.</p>
<p>“If you knew the amount of times I’ve fantasised about this,” he’s saying over Aziraphale’s little moans. “The amounts of times I’ve thought of undoing all your bloody buttons. One by one. Touching your skin. Just like this. Getting you hard as I kissed you. Undoing your trousers, going down on my knees and sucking you off in that fucking chair in my shop, until you couldn’t think about anything else anymore.”</p>
<p>Aziraphale finds the willpower to crack his eyelids open. He smiles faintly, as if he’d just woken up from a long sleep. “I – I think – we <em>will</em> have time for that, love.”</p>
<p>And even though Aziraphale is the one being touched, Crowley lets out a long, low sound at his words. The smile on his face is bright and honest as he starts to leave a new trail of adoration on Aziraphale’s neck using his teeth and tongue. “You <em>are</em> a bit of a bastard, mmh? Aren’t ya?” And he dips down, sucking his pulse point in time with his strokes.</p>
<p>“I… ah… think so,” Aziraphale laughs, and then whines when he feels Crowley’s moans reverberating on his skin like ripples in a pond. It all starts being too much, too soon, and he squeezes Crowley’s arm. “Darling, I – I don’t want this to end. Not just – not just yet…”</p>
<p>Crowley stops working wonders on his neck and slows the movements of his hand, but he doesn’t take it away. He wets his lips. “N-not just yet?”</p>
<p>They’re both very still, all of a sudden, and breathing hard. Aziraphale curls his toes on the rumpled sheets, flexes his fingers on Crowley’s twenty-nine inches waist. “Yes. I… I’d still like to… to do something else.”</p>
<p>“You sure?” Crowley’s free hand travels to Aziraphale’s forehead to move away some curls. Aziraphale turns his head to kiss his palm and nuzzle it. In the back of his mind, he starts to think of nibbling the soft part of that hand feeding him relief, not to leave marks on it or to claim it, but just to know what Crowley’s reaction would be. If it’s something he’d enjoy.</p>
<p>Well… Next time. Next time.</p>
<p>As if he could read his mind, Crowley adds, “You said it yourself, we have all the time in the world, angel. Whatever you want to do, we can take it slow, no pressure.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(Crowley doesn’t know there will be a special introduction in the pink kitchen of a house in a small village, down in the south. Aunt Tracy regards Aziraphale with plain interest and a hint of excitement, the kind of unashamedly loving gaze you’d expect from a mother.</p>
<p>“Settled down, haven’t you?” she coos to Crowley, and he nods. He can’t say he isn’t proud, and his Aunt’s body language is reassuring, but he can’t help being a little anxious of her reaction to his fiancé. He can imagine Aziraphale must feel similarly too, because his cheeks have become rosy under her scrutiny.</p>
<p>The following silence is stretching a little too long, and Crowley is already thinking of something to say when, suddenly, she pulls Aziraphale into one of her typical hugs. They’re the ones Crowley knew so well before moving to London, the ones that silently say, “You’re my whole family. Wherever you may go in the world, this will be your protection.” Her orange wig sways in a flurry of perfume and her multicolour silk dress swirls as if it, too, wanted to hug Aziraphale.</p>
<p>“I <em>knew</em> my nephew had good taste,” she confesses in Aziraphale’s ear, still hugging him, not low enough that Crowley can’t hear her. She lets him go and gives a vigorous nod. “He’s been waiting for you for so long. You just <em>had </em>to be special. I felt it with my inner eye. You were <em>the one</em>.”</p>
<p>Still a little taken aback by the more-than-warm welcome, Aziraphale smiles, shy and flattered, and Crowley beams in return.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Crowley, please, I… I don’t want slow. I need more.”</p>
<p>Crowley’s breath is calmer, now, but still warm, and it still lands shaky on his cheek. “Ok. Ok, ok, angel…” He gulps. “What’d you like?” He keeps stroking his whole body, as if he couldn’t believe this was real, like a person experiencing the world for the first time. <em>Experiencing me</em>, Aziraphale thinks. His head reels.</p>
<p>“I…” he hesitates, then he wets his lips and gathers the courage. “I’d like to – to fuck you. If… if you are alright with it.”</p>
<p>Crowley stops breathing for a couple of seconds. “<em>Jesus Christ</em>.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(Crowley doesn’t know there will be a night in the back room of Aziraphale's new tailor shop, the one they’ll open next to his own new hair salon in the village. He’ll be leaning against a tall mirror with his forehead on a forearm, naked, safe and shameless, slightly bent forward, reaching back with his fingers and making way into himself, stretching and exploring as his breath fogs the mirror up.</p>
<p>Aziraphale is sitting comfortably in a spacious armchair pulled up very, very close behind him, so close that Crowley could easily sit in his lap just bending his legs; he’s enjoying the view and murmuring encouragements, words of love and praise, palming himself in his trousers, and from time to time their eyes meet in the mirror. Soft hands around his waist finally pull him back; Aziraphale helps Crowley sit in the armchair with him, bracketing his plush thighs with his folded legs. He lowers himself onto Aziraphale, letting him sink mindlessly in; and while Aziraphale is still dressed to the nines – if it weren’t for his rolled up shirt sleeves, an unfastened belt and a lowered zip – Crowley couldn’t be more naked.</p>
<p>Aziraphale places chaste kisses on his shoulder blades, perhaps following a trail of freckles Crowley can't see, and his now fully grown beard sends little shivers down his spine, making his toes curl. Crowley arches his back into the touch, ruts down harder as the new angle pushes Aziraphale’s length against that sweet hidden spot inside him. A hand grasps his cock firmly, stroking, stroking in time with their hips as he fucks himself on Aziraphale, his hands grasping those thick forearms he’s admired from afar for years, so tight that the skin on Crowley’s knuckles stretches in valleys and peaks. He’s probably whining and moaning desperately, making all sort of broken and barely coherent sounds, but he couldn’t care less. His whole world has narrowed down to Aziraphale, Aziraphale, always Aziraphale and forever Aziraphale.</p>
<p>He watches himself in the mirror and he sees a portrait of disconcerting debauchery and decadence – his chest flushed and heaving, flat stomach contracting rhythmically, long hair swaying wildly, and his cock, red and aching, being taken care of by the most loving of hands. Aziraphale keeps his other hand on Crowley’s chest to support him, right next to his heart which is thumping as quick as a hare’s, so much that it feels ready to jump into his palm. In the reflection, Crowley spots Aziraphale’s legs, still bracketed by Crowley's spread thighs on his pressed trousers, his strong forearms dusted with golden hair, and his eyes twinkling over his shoulder, looking in the mirror as well, fond and mischievous. Being stretched and filled by Aziraphale, being the one to take him in, being like this because of him – it all feels so good, so <em>good</em>,<em> fuck</em> – all his nerve endings are crackling and fizzling, and when he feels Aziraphale's lips smiling, pressed at the centre of his back, it’s as if lightning were striking him, and he comes hard.</p>
<p>The whole world shakes with him until he floats in bliss. Aziraphale keeps moving, keeps talking beautiful nonsense that rattles his bones and turns them inside out, and finally he comes as well with a moan, resting his forehead on Crowley’s shoulder.</p>
<p>Crowley opens his eyes and looks in the mirror. He feels boneless, his chest is heaving, and his whole body is still flushed and sweating. Aziraphale’s hands are stroking his sides idly as he, too, catches his breath; there is a mess on Crowley’s stomach, a mess under him, and there are two white lines on the mirror too, slightly to the left.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Is… is that a yes?” Aziraphale asks.</p>
<p>Crowley snaps back form the shock he was in. “Fuck, fuck, yes – bloody well yes, angel, <em>yes</em>… just… gimme a sec.” He bends and twists uncomfortably on the bed, escaping Aziraphale’s embrace for a while to reach his jeans on the bedroom floor. After some pulling (they are, after all, extremely tight trousers), he produces a condom out of one of the pockets.</p>
<p>“Oh, someone’s an optimist,” Aziraphale, says, relieved to discover that Crowley had silently hoped for this to the point of coming prepared. Crowley produces a series of consonants out of his mouth, but doesn’t deny the implications, and this makes Aziraphale’s throat a little dry. In turn, he stretches to the side, opening the middle drawer of his nightstand to grab a lube bottle.</p>
<p>“Oh, someone’s been having fun,” Crowley remarks with a lightly mocking tone. The bottle isn’t exactly brand new and he looks at it with interest and amusement.</p>
<p>Aziraphale feels his face becoming, if possible, three shades redder, up to his hairline, but he still manages to keep some composure. “I-I hope it’s clear that I, well, I haven’t – haven’t used this with, uh, anyone else. I’ve been in love with <em>you</em> for years, after all.”</p>
<p>Crowley’s face starts twisting minutely, as if he’s doing some very complicated mental calculations. “So if you haven’t been… well, uhm – for years, you’ve been –” He gulps, his voice edging on squeaky. “On yourself?”</p>
<p>“Well, uhm, yes… from time to time. As a matter of fact, I’ve – I’ve definitely thought of, uh, many possible <em>configurations</em>, and, they – they all work for me. What I want to be clear is that I… I don’t mind being the – the giver or… or the receiver.” Logically speaking, there should be no reason to blush. They’re two consenting adults, for heaven’s sake; this kind of discussion should be routine. And yet. Not only does he feel his face burning, but he also notices that Crowley’s cheeks, too, are almost as red as his hair now. “I know I’ve already said what I’d like to do tonight with you – together – but… the – the important thing is that I want to do only what you feel like doing. And only if you agree. And not only tonight, of course, but… well. For as long as you want.”</p>
<p>Crowley is looking at him as if he were hypnotised. Aziraphale squirms a little in place, and is already thinking of something to say to clarify his point; but after two beats, Crowley says, “Aziraphale Fell, you bloody wonder, you better start kissing me again right fucking now or ’m gonna –”</p>
<p>Aziraphale will never get to know the end of that fond threat because, hearing these words and placing the bottle on the nightstand, he surges back to grant Crowley’s wish.</p>
<p>And it is on again, this time with a frenetic dance of lips, of tongues licking and teeth nibbling. When Crowley pushes forward into another dazzling kiss, Aziraphale falls back against the mattress under the impetus, and for a few delightful minutes they just roll around in the bed like farmers would on the hay.</p>
<p>Crowley is making all sorts of happy sounds, and the best part is that Aziraphale can feel his smile everywhere Crowley’s mouth lands – on his lips, on his neck, on his cheeks, on his chest, on his shoulders.</p>
<p>When they run out of breath, Aziraphale spends some time running his fingers through Crowley’s hair. Soft, fiery, everything he could have ever imagined and even more. Crowley, sprawled onto him, grinds their hips together minutely and presses his head onto his hand like a cat asking to be petted. The tenderness of it urges Aziraphale to hug him down by the shoulders, pressing the both of them flush together. He kisses his cheeks and the corner of his mouth before going back to sucking his jaw and tasting his tongue.</p>
<p>Then, with some reluctance, Crowley pulls back and starts pawing the bed until he finds the forgotten condom that had fallen from his hands, and he opens the package carefully.</p>
<p>He hesitates; then – “May I?”</p>
<p>Aziraphale wonders how wild his own eyes must look. The anticipation is probably making him blink way too rapidly. “Please,” he manages to croak.</p>
<p>Crowley’s hands are very slow, very careful on him, rolling the condom on like it’s a ritual or a clothing ceremony. The mere touch is enough to make Aziraphale’s legs feel electric, to send a shockwave that reverberates all over him down to his toes.</p>
<p>“Do you need…?” Aziraphale asks, but Crowley has already sprinted for the bottle of lube on the nightstand and he is slicking his fingers. He scoots up closer, resting his legs around Aziraphale’s yielding waist. With a hand on Aziraphale’s thigh and looking into his eyes with a bottomless hunger, he reaches down, and starts preparing himself.</p>
<p>Aziraphale is simply entranced. There’s too much to take into consideration – Crowley’s heaving chest, his arched neck, the shivers running through him that make his fingers grasp his thigh hard, his red, long, incredible hair, the throbbing length of him, beckoning and asking to be touched. He just doesn’t know where to look; so he relies on touch. He trails little kisses on Crowley’s shoulder and collarbones, placing a hand against his back to support him as his long fingers find their way in. Crowley arches into his touch. For some reason that Aziraphale can’t understand, he is clearly trying not to make a sound, whimpering and biting his lower lip; but Aziraphale has other ideas.</p>
<p>“My darling,” he says, nipping gently and repeatedly at the juncture between neck and shoulder, going down to suck on a collarbone, scooting closer, pressing Crowley flusher against him and circling one nipple with a finger; and perhaps that’s the combination Crowley needs to start moaning aloud, because he does. “There you go. Don’t be ashamed. Let me hear you, you perfect thing.” Aziraphale smiles, and his lips chase the sound up that fantastic throat until they swallow it with a single long kiss.</p>
<p>“Are you ready?”</p>
<p>If the roll of Crowley’s hips weren’t enough to convey how far gone he is already, he adds, “Yes, fuck, <em>fuck</em>. Just – just fuck me, angel, please. ’M ready, oh God, oh God…”</p>
<p>So Aziraphale touches Crowley’s waist (<em>Twenty-nine</em>), helping him raise his hips and guiding himself against Crowley’s entrance, and finally, with a shaken sob from them both, he starts sliding in little by little. Crowley’s still tight, to be fair, and this prompts him to slow down even more not to hurt him. He eases into Crowley gently, looking up and watching closely for any sign of discomfort. Crowley has grabbed a fistful of Aziraphale’s hair and is giving a long, deep moan, but the look on his face is mirroring Aziraphale’s bliss even with his eyes closed. When he’s fully seated, Aziraphale strokes Crowley’s sides, giving them both time to adjust.</p>
<p>Crowley opens his eyes to look down at him and gives a breathless chuckle. “Aziraphale… this is… this is real, yeah?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(Crowley doesn’t know there will come a night when, inevitably, there is a storm outside. He’s never mentioned his fear of thunderstorms before; it never really came up, but it will then. And Crowley doesn’t know there will be soothing hands on his back, the soft hug of his angel shielding him under the covers, letting him hide his face against his chest. He takes deep, long, shaky breaths, and Aziraphale whispers and tells him all sort of calming things, keeps talking to ground him to their bed and the covers surrounding them.</p>
<p>Crowley <em>is</em> scared, because it just keeps pouring and pouring and the thunders are so loud that the window panes rattle in their frames; but his nose quickly fills with the familiarity of Aziraphale’s relaxing shampoo – the chamomile one, he knows it so well – mixed with the suffused scent of his skin. Between one explosion and the next, Aziraphale’s voice is low, clear and unafraid and his arms enclose him completely; Crowley dares to feel safe and brave and, little by little, he drifts off to sleep.</p>
<p>And Crowley doesn’t know that, later, when they have weathered enough storms together, he’ll let Aziraphale love him silently while the rain is pouring and the thunders rumble outside. His angel’s arms will hold him even then, and he will feel no fear. He won’t be afraid.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Crowley searches his eyes, waiting for an answer, and Aziraphale is so affected by his look that he has to rest his forehead on Crowley’s. He closes his eyes and exhales.</p>
<p>“Oh, my love. I do believe so. It would be <em>extremely</em> unpleasant if all of this weren’t true.”</p>
<p>The tiny shift in their position pushes Aziraphale just a little deeper. “Holy <em>fuck</em>.” Crowley tilts Aziraphale’s head back, and places an open-mouthed kiss on his neck. “A-Aziraphale… you… oh Jesus. It’s… you’re – you feel amazing.”</p>
<p>Aziraphale feels a rush of something flowing down from his head, into his chest, filling his heart completely (joy, he decides; he's going to call it joy); he presses his nose into that neck, licks Crowley’s prominent Adam's apple with wide strokes of his tongue, grazes his teeth on the shell of his ear. He cants his hip lower, then up again, and helps Crowley find a rhythm with each thrust.</p>
<p>Each shift allows Crowley to pick the pace up a little; he mewls, throwing his head back, and isn’t he absolutely the most gorgeous creature Aziraphale has ever seen? That neck looks so tempting, so inviting, all stretched out before him at an absurd angle.</p>
<p>Soon Crowley whips his head back to look down between them, and an even more intense flush spreads down his chest as he rocks over and over again on him. Aziraphale is already half gone with the sensation of being inside Crowley, at last, of feeling the way he takes him in and fits around him like a glove; but then Crowley’s lovely fingers start kneading his waist, his bottom, his back, they cup the curve of Aziraphale's belly, press down on his thighs behind him, hard, harder, the hardest.</p>
<p>"’Ziraphale… ’Ziraphale," Crowley slurs, panting, with the blurry, drunken voice of a man who was drowning and has just come up for a gulp of air from the bottom of the sea. It seems as though his hands can't get enough of Aziraphale’s skin, as if he didn’t know what to do with them, now that they <em>can </em>do something, and so they just want to do all the things at once.</p>
<p>Aziraphale smiles against his sharp jaw, and he wants to laugh and laugh, and by now his own hands move as if they had a soul of their own. Up, up those shoulders (he doesn’t need to take measurements; he only needs to <em>map</em> them now); up, up that neck slim and vibrant with breath, bending back against his hand in invitation; Aziraphale sucks his worship into it, just below the ear, and when he kisses the freckles on his cheeks and nose, he feels Crowley’s eyelashes flutter against his face like tiny butterflies.</p>
<p>Aziraphale reaches further up, until his fingers brush the roots of Crowley’s hair on his nape. This time, he doesn’t stop, and he slides his hand fully into it.</p>
<p>The fabric of Crowley's hair is so much better than anything he's ever touched. It's a sweet marriage of silk and velvet, but with the freshness of linen, the airy quality of tulle, the warmth of Aziraphale’s beloved tartan. His palm rests naturally on the back of Crowley’s head, holding and cradling one of his most vulnerable spots before closing his fingers in. Crowley gasps, flutters his eyelashes, throws his head back to chase his grip – and now there's more of the plains of his neck for Aziraphale's tongue to roam on, more skin his lips can trace.</p>
<p>Aziraphale resumes the worship of the love of his life – his own Vitruvian man who always reached out to him, perfect inside his square, finally welcoming Aziraphale’s roundness. Still thrusting up as best as he can, Aziraphale nips an ear, then he draws back to watch his every movement; Crowley’s eyes are closed and his hands seem to follow a new, mysterious path of their own on Aziraphale’s body.</p>
<p>Aziraphale’s hand tightens in Crowley’s red forest of hair, tugging the tiniest amount. “Is this alright?”</p>
<p>“God,” Crowley half-cries; and then he half-whispers, “God.”</p>
<p>Aziraphale’s hand is full of Crowley’s hair and there’s so much of it that it spills over. His mouth is full of Crowley’s throat and neck, and finally, finally he can taste the way he breathes.</p>
<p>Crowley keeps driving himself onto him, their joined bodies sliding against each other, their voices making sounds Aziraphale will never forget for as long as he lives.</p>
<p>“Yes, yes – oh, oh, my love. My sweet friend. Like that – like that – take what you want. Take what you need.”</p>
<p>“Fuck. You… you talk so pretty… even now…”</p>
<p>There are more butterfly kisses on Aziraphale’s cheek, and he laughs, quiet and breathless as Crowley eagerly buries his nose in his hair and inhales a big gulp of air.</p>
<p>Aziraphale starts wrapping his arms around Crowley’s chest. “Is that what you want?” he asks, as he feels white heat coiling inside of him.</p>
<p>“Want you, just you. Always, always been you.”</p>
<p>“You have me, darling. You have me. I’m here. I’m here.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(Crowley doesn’t know there will be a door swung open and two newlyweds tumbling into their cottage in the South Downs, two men in love devouring each other after a wedding banquet spent exchanging <em>looks</em>. They’re wearing two matching, bespoke wedding suits sewn by none other than Aziraphale – his own peachy, and very soft, and Crowley’s black and white one, very tight; and their hands sport two shiny wedding rings.</p>
<p>Aziraphale’s eyes, usually bright blue, are almost black, his pupils are so wide. Crowley doesn’t know he’ll be slammed into the nearest wall – there, right next to the door, his wrists pinned on either side of his face by two strong, meticulous and hard-working hands, and a voice growling on his lips, “You like tight? I’ll give you <em>tight</em>.” Aziraphale falls to his knees, gets rid of the belt, yanks trousers and slips down, tight as they are, and takes Crowley’s cock into his mouth so deep and so fast that it almost gives Crowley whiplash.</p>
<p>Crowley’s head thumps against the wall and he almost chokes with the electric current running through him, because, <em>fuck</em>, his husband’s mouth is warm and tight around him, his beard scratches gently the upper part of his thighs, his hands press his hips hard into the wall and may leave thumbprints there, his lips are pink and stretched and shining, his tongue rubs that beautiful spot on the underside of his length, and from time to time Aziraphale pauses to suck and to swallow and to tease his slit with the tip of his tongue before starting again. Crowley can’t do anything but grip his hair as tight as he’s never done before, and cry out, and come straight down his throat while Aziraphale keeps him there against the wall and moans around him.</p>
<p>And he doesn’t know that, later, after all the clothes have disappeared and they’re lying together on their bed, he’ll fuck Aziraphale slowly and deeply like he deserves, holding hands so tight against the mattress that they, too, will be making love in their own way: palms against palms, fingers intertwined, pressing one against the other with every careful thrust of Crowley’s hips. He’ll go slow, so very slow, kissing Aziraphale all the while, seeing how pleasure paints his face and gifts him with that particular kind of smile; and when it’s over, he’ll stay there, nestled inside him for a little while longer, until they drift off gently to sleep.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>They slide so beautifully together, one inside the other. To think that Aziraphale was forbidding himself <em>this</em> sounds like madness to his pleasure-soaked brain. What was the point of denying? Or the self-imposed restrain? He could have had the love of his life here, in his lap, so much sooner.</p>
<p>But these bittersweet thoughts float away and quickly disappear from sight, carried by a gust of passion as Aziraphale fists both hands in Crowley’s hair, and as Crowley moans without any sense of decency or self-control. He rests his forehead against Aziraphale’s neck, then he throws his head back completely and draws Aziraphale closer to kiss and suck his chest.</p>
<p>Crowley presses even closer, if possible, trying to hug Aziraphale completely as he drives himself over and over again on him, rolling his hips as best as he can. He looks absolutely lost and desperate, and Aziraphale takes one hand away from the gentle fire of his hair, slides it quickly down his chest and stomach and closes it around Crowley’s cock.</p>
<p>Crowley gives an honest-to-God shout at the sensation, something that makes the feral part of Aziraphale’s brain take over completely, and from there it’s all thrusts and matching pumps of his fist, and Crowley letting himself be loved like that. “Angel,” he manages to say once, almost supplicant.</p>
<p>The urge for release is annihilating, and they rut in a maze of moans and limbs, faster, with trails of kisses and swollen lips.</p>
<p>Aziraphale’s left hand tightens once more in his hair, his forearm resting across Crowley’s back, and with a broken shout Crowley comes all over their stomachs, clinging tight to him and quivering. Aziraphale holds him, holds him through the aftershocks, keeps holding him as he runs a soothing hand on his back. He must be saying something into Crowley’s ear, some light-winged words that he’s not even sure Crowley can grasp at the moment, but he can say them, and he will.</p>
<p>When the aftershocks have subsided, Aziraphale pulls himself out briefly, lays Crowley, who is still breathing heavily, back onto the mattress, and enters him again with care. Crowley winces a little, but his hands grab Aziraphale’s bottom, pushing him deeper inside. It’s just a matter of some thrusts, from there, and he comes as well while reality shatters around him. He’s vaguely aware of kissing Crowley during his last thrusts, again and again, and one after the other the splinters of the world fall back together.</p>
<p>When the waves have retreated, Aziraphale rests his forehead on Crowley’s. He’s smiling so wide that his cheeks hurt, and Crowley seems to be in a similar state as well as he brushes Aziraphale’s curls away from his damp forehead.</p>
<p>Aziraphale has never felt so grounded to the moment, not even last night during their love confession. And yet he is still a little incredulous of everything that’s happened in a matter of three days. How can such a perfect happiness be even real? Is this what is waiting for him for as long as Crowley will have him, possibly all their life? He just closes his eyes, and when he feels Crowley pecking his cheeks, his chin, the tip of his nose, he remembers once again that yes. Yes, it’s all real.</p>
<p>Aziraphale pulls out of him slowly, and they both hiss at that last slide of their skin, oversensitive and blissed out as they are. They lie down next to each other for some minutes; eventually Aziraphale takes Crowley’s hand and moves to the shower with him. They help washing each other, change the bedding, and bury themselves straight back under the soft tartan covers, their smiles still firmly in place, their fingers unafraid to touch now. And finally, peacefully, they fall asleep together, with Crowley’s cheek resting just a little bit on Aziraphale’s head.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(Crowley doesn’t know they’ll clean the oven together, after Aziraphale has burned his first attempt at a soufflé because he’d been too absorbed in one of his books. He’ll dust the bookcase, paying attention not to misplace any of the tomes his husband cares about so much and can find only in his organised chaos. They’ll brush their teeth side by side in the morning and before going to sleep, they’ll change the bed sheets together, they’ll elbow each other and splash sudsy water as they wash and rinse the dishes after dinner; he’ll take up gardening – something he’s always wanted to try – as Aziraphale learns the old-fashioned dances he’d never had time for; they’ll paint the walls in their favourite colours, rearranging the furniture and choosing silverware and dishes; they’ll have matching mugs shaped funnily, like angels and demons, or ducks and coiled snakes.</p>
<p>They’ll create a tailor-made new existence together in a cottage in the South Downs, surrounded by people who love them.</p>
<p>Crowley doesn’t know yet that all of these dreams will come true, and many more. But he <em>has</em> his suspicions, and he waits eagerly for what the future has in store.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Aziraphale wakes up on Sunday morning to crisp white sheets and a bony arm slumped on his waist. The sun filters in from the bedroom window, and the light dances and tiptoes on Crowley’s hair, spread all around on the pillow and on his shoulders like satin.</p>
<p>Aziraphale watches Crowley sleep and he feels it again. Relief. Relief for a new life starting together, relief for being able to have this. So simply. It’s beautiful, it’s a miracle. It’s almost ineffable.</p>
<p>“Hello, love,” Aziraphale says when Crowley stirs, and he reaches for his hand under the cover.</p>
<p>“Hello, love,” Crowley echoes, and gives a little squeeze, moving closer to peck Aziraphale on the tip of his nose.</p>
<p>Aziraphale stays quiet for some seconds, brushing the back of Crowley’s hand with a thumb. “You know… I was considering growing a beard.”</p>
<p>Crowley’s eyes light up. “A beard?”</p>
<p>“Yes.” He draws back his hand and rubs his own cheek, absent-mindedly. Crowley’s fingers follow it, palm lying on its back. “I’ve been wondering whether it might look good on me. For a change.”</p>
<p>Crowley smiles. “Why shouldn’t it?” He sounds already intrigued by the idea.</p>
<p>“Oh, I don’t know… I’ve never tried. It will be interesting, I think. Besides, I have my personal barber to help me style it.”</p>
<p>“Oh,” Crowley says. “Do I know them?”</p>
<p>“Mmh, you should, love. Incredibly talented. And more than that, he’s thoughtful, and careful, and sweet. He’s not afraid of telling me the truth, or to guide me, but he does it with a gentleness that nobody else is capable of. He’s also my best friend, the person who knows me even better than I do. I’d lay my whole life in his hands, not just my hair or my beard.”</p>
<p>The corners of Crowley’s eyes glisten funnily, almost as if he were about to cry. “Lucky fellow,” he whispers. He takes Aziraphale’s hand, and kisses his palm, sweetly and silently; and they both know they don’t need any other words.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>This is my first multichaptered work to be this long AND completed. I'm... feeling a little emotional :')<br/>Thanks again to <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheKnittingJedi/pseuds/TheKnittingJedi">TheKnittingJedi</a> for being the best and most patient beta EVER!!! ILY so much, friend! 🧡<br/>Thanks again also to <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/hanap/pseuds/hanap">hanap</a>, <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/quiltedspacemittens/pseuds/quiltedspacemittens">quiltedspacemittens</a> and <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/NaroMoreau/pseuds/NaroMoreau">NaroMoreau</a> for being the most incredible and supportive trio of beans :D 🧡</p>
<p>Thank you for reading to the end! I hope you enjoyed! If you liked this story, I have some other AUs for you:</p>
<p>- My <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26994637">Telegraph AU</a> (one shot, E)<br/>- My <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24824764/chapters/60045781">Spaghetti Western AU</a> (WIP, M)<br/>- My <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/20938547/chapters/49779695">Musicians AU</a> (WIP, E)</p>
<p>That said, before going on with my current WIPs and other new projects, I will probably take a little break to outline and start writing my GO Book fest fic, which should be posted in March.<br/>In the meantime, please keep being kind to each other! Love ya! :D 🧡🧡🧡</p>
        </blockquote><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Come say hello on <a href="https://www.tumblr.com/blog/saretton">Tumblr</a>. :)</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>